Baseball: John Hughes pitches Nazareth into second straight title game

JOLIET — John Hughes didn’t have a lot of strikeouts on Friday in a Class 3A semifinal against Sycamore. But every time the Spartans threatened to score, the Nazareth junior lefty got a key strikeout to escape the jam.

Hughes pitched five scoreless innings helping the Roadrunners to a 3-0 win and reach the Class 3A state championship for the second straight year.

“Second and third, nobody out, that’s the guy we want on the mound. I have the utmost confidence that he was going to get out of that situation because I’ve seen him do it so often.”

—  Lee Milano, Nazareth coach

“I live for those moments,” Hughes said. “In those moments you’re either going to fold or have confidence in yourself. Coach [Lee] Milano, he has complete confidence in me and I’ve just got to keep trusting my stuff and that’s what I did. It ended up working out. It was some stressful situations but I got out of them.”

Pitching with a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the third, Hughes hit leadoff hitter Kiefer Tarnoki and gave up a double to Matt Rosado.

But with runners and second and third and no outs, he struck out Tommy Townsend. He then enticed cleanup hitter Kyle Hartmann to pop up in the infield and got Lucas Winburn to ground out to short.

Those three hitters all were hitting over .350 and had a combined 20 home runs and 104 RBIs.

“Second and third, nobody out, that’s the guy we want on the mound,” Milano said. “I have the utmost confidence that he was going to get out of that situation because I’ve seen him do it so often.”

In the bottom of the first of a scoreless game, Tarnoki and Townsend singled to put runners on the corners with one out, but Hughes got Hartmann swinging then got Winbrun to pop up to center.

His third strikeout also came with a runner in the fifth still in a 2-0 game, getting Townsend looking after Rosado walked. He allowed four hits, walked one and hit a batter.

“I think maybe I just get locked in just a little bit more and a little bit more and have a little more confidence in my pitches,” Hughes said. “And when I get in that mindset I strike guys out.”

The Roadrunners (33-6) broke through off Sycamore (33-6) and starter Jimmy Amptmann in the top of the third. Jaden Fauske walked and Lucas Smith singled with one out. Nick Drtina singled home Fuaske, then later in the inning Landon Thome flew out to score Smith.

That was all Hughes and Fauske, who came on in relief in the sixth, would need, but the Roadrunners added an insurance run in the seventh. Smith doubled and scored on a two-out single by Thome.

Fauske didn’t allow a hit in his two innings and just one walk. After getting runners to second and third, Hughes retired eight straight and Sycamore only had two runners, both walks, the rest of the game.

“That’s a really really good hitting team,” Milano said. “To hold them to the amount of hits they had and no runs is saying a lot about our defense and our guys that pitched.”

Smith had a single, double and scored twice. Drtina and Thome each had two hits and an RBI. Nazareth had nine hits in the game and stranded 10 runners on base.

The Roadrunners will play Saturday for their second straight state championship. They’ll face Grayslake Central at the conclusion of the third-place game between Sycamore and Effingham, which starts at 9 a.m.

“I mean the plan, just like, last year, is to come out, stay in the moment and compete every pitch, every at-bat, every ground ball, and to just fight and fight, and don’t go down easy,” Drtina said. “You just have to stay in the moment, really work.”