As the innings piled on and they continued to find themselves trailing on the scoreboard, even as they hit the seventh inning, the players on the Marquette baseball team never lost their confidence.

And with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning of Saturday’s Class 2A Bishop McNamara Regional championship against the host Fightin’ Irish, Anthony Couch showed just why they felt that way.

The senior second baseman sent a walk-off two-run home run sailing over the right center field fence to make the Crusaders regional champions by a 4-3 final tally, their lone lead of the game coming after the final pitch.

“For me personally, it was confidence,” Couch said. “I had confidence in everyone. This was the fourth time through seeing [McNamara pitcher Callaghan O’Connor]. We’d seen all his pitches. I was very confident in everyone. Obviously got to be a little – not scared, but nervous. I was confident in myself."

The winners of the last two Class 1A state titles, including last year’s championship also via walk-off fashion, the Crusaders (34-3) took a bump up to Class 2A this spring. Senior pitcher Alec Novotney, who scored last year’s championship winning run, said that’s a challenge the team’s rallied around.

“We’ve embraced it all year,” Novotney said. “We’ve heard it from everybody - it’s 1A, it’s 1A. We know we can play with anyone, and I think we proved that today against a pretty good team.”

Novotney, a Valparaiso signee, was one half of a primetime pitchers’ duel with O’Connor, a Notre Dame commit, with both senior right-handers working through the first three innings with goose eggs on the scoreboard.

The Irish strung together five hits in the top of the fourth to break the ice, a rally started by Coen Demack’s leadoff double. O’Connor singled him in the next at-bat, with Gavin Jones and Ian Irps adding RBI knocks themselves to put the Irish up 3-0 halfway home.

But Novotney locked in after that, blending a lively fastball with a slider and curveball for a perfect final three innings as part of a complete game that saw him strike out 12 and allow three earned runs on six hits and no walks.

A competitor through and through, he relished the opportunity to battle against another premier pitcher like O’Connor, who struck out 10 and allowed four earned runs on six hits and two walks in his complete game.

“It was really fun,” Novotney said. “I think that was one of the best games we had all year, even the state championship last year. That was a walk-off too, two good arms going at it all game. We snuck it out at the end.”

Couch drove in all four Marquette runs, all with two outs, as he got the Crusaders on the board with a two-run, two-out double in the fifth. And when he came back to the plate and worked a 3-1 count, Novotney saw a rare occurrence when his teammate took one to the opposite field for the walk-off winner.

“I still don’t believe it happened,” Novotney said. “He smoked it to right center. That was the first ball I’ve seen him hit that wasn’t to left.”

The Crusaders will head to the Class 2A Herscher Sectional semifinals against No. 6 IC Catholic at 2 p.m. Wednesday. McNamara, the No. 4 seed, saw its season end with a 22-9 record in what coach Aaron Fuerst saw as a winning effort that came up an out shy of an upset.

“I thought both teams competed throughout the game,” Fuerst said. “Obviously we got on them early, but they’re a resilient team. Cal did a tremendous job on the mound today. We had one more out to get and they were the better team today. They had the last at-bat today and they didn’t quit.”

A season that was full of injury battles and adversity when a March 10 tornado took them away from a thoroughly damaged home field for more than a month, Fuerst credited the four-deep senior class of O’Connor, Demack, Irps and Logan Popovich for helping guide the Irish along through adversity both on and off the field.

“I couldn’t have done it without our senior leadership,” Fuerst said. “They helped us grow up as a team. I look forward to seeing those young guys come back next year. Hopefully they’ve learned from this experience, but I couldn’t be more proud of the way they competed.”

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Baseball: Class 2A Bishop McNamara Regional championship: Marquette vs. Bishop McNamara Marquette players celebrate as Anthony Couch, center, hit a walk-off two-run home run during Marquette's 4-3 victory over Bishop McNamara in the IHSA Class 2A Bishop McNamara Regional championship on Saturday, May 30, 2026. (Tiffany Blanchette)