Oak Park 11, Wheaton North 1
On a day like this you don't dwell on the end of the road.
You focus on the journey.
The magical run of Wheaton North's baseball team came to a disappointing conclusion with Friday's 11-1 six-inning loss to Oak Park in the Class 4A semifinals at Joliet's Silver Cross Field.
The Falcons (24-14), making their first Final Four appearance, will play Neuqua Valley (32-7) at 4 p.m. today in the third-place game.
Regardless of dashed state title dreams, pride rang throughout the players and coaches as they continued the greatest season in program history. Pride again will carry the Falcons in their quest for a win in today's finale.
"We need that game to show people that we're a much better team than what we showed (Friday)," said Falcons senior catcher Ryan Javech. "We want to bounce back (today)."
Oak Park (29-9), which rapped out 13 hits, jumped to a 2-0 lead in the top of the first inning off Falcons starting pitcher Trey Martin (6-1). That was plenty of support for Huskies starter Drew Golz (8-1), who struck out eight and scattered 3 hits in 5 innings.
Wheaton North briefly pulled within 2-1 in the bottom of the second when Travis Otto led off with a double and later scored on Brett Kirchhofer's single to center. As the runs mounted for Oak Park, though, the hill became too tough for the Falcons to climb.
"They kept adding runs and we just kept our heads in it," said Otto, who went 2-for-3. "We kept trying to string a few runs together, but it just didn't happen."
The game belonged to Huskies shortstop Jo Jo Maldanado. The junior cranked 2 home runs, giving him six in his last seven games. For the game he went 4-for-4 with a double, 4 runs scored and 6 RBI.
"We were seeing (Martin's) pitches good," Maldanado said. "Everybody was hitting him hard. When we came the second time around we were just all on him."
Maldanado's first home run, a 3-run shot, put the lead at 5-1 in the fourth inning - an inning the Falcons would love to have back after a pair of close defensive plays they couldn't convert into outs.
Max Edwards' fourth-inning RBI single made it 6-1. Three more runs followed in the fifth inning on run-scoring hits by Kyle Glancy, Andy Brashler and Mark Bernthal.
"They've got a great hitting lineup and we knew that coming in," said Wheaton North coach Dan Schoessling. "I'm still real proud of our team. We're very disappointed, but we're really looking forward for a chance to get back out there (today) and kind of show what kind of team we really have."
Maldanado capped his day with a 2-run homer in the sixth inning. Oak Park's Scott Rasley pitched an inning of relief for Golz to close the game.
"I'd say after we got the 2 runs I was feeling pretty comfortable," Golz said. "I just got more and more comfortable as the game went on."