St. Bede‘s Gus Burr continued his hot streak at the plate in Thursday’s Tri-County Conference game against host Woodland/Flanagan-Cornell.

Burr went 3 for 3 with a pair of doubles, a walk and four runs batted in to help led the Bruins to a 18-3 victory over the Warriors in four innings.

He is now 7 of 9 with four doubles and seven RBIs in his last three games.

“Today my focus was to just hit the ball on a line,” Burr said. “It seems like for most of the season so far, I’m either hitting the ball in the air or on the ground, so today I was really about squaring the ball up and trying to hit line drives. I came up a couple times with runners in scoring position and in those at-bats I was just trying to be selective and make sure I either drove runners in or moved them up. I guess it all worked out for me today.”

Burr opened the scoring in the top half of the first by singling home Ranbir Saini who had poked a one out double off WFC starter Brayden Matsko. Then after a base hit by Naks Baker, Carson Rive lined a two-run single to put St. Bede up 3-0.

“I feel like the last few games I’m starting to see the ball well,” Burr said. “The key for me is to just continue to keep my approach simple and go up each time to the plate with confidence.

“Despite the three runs, we came out in the first inning with flat energy, but coming into the dugout for the top of the second the message was we needed to pick things up and we did.”

WFC responded against Bruins’ starter Geno Dinges in its half of the inning, taking advantage of three walks and an error while also getting singles from Nolan Price and Blaine Bates. Brayden Matsko, Noah Lopez and Bates had RBIs in the first to tie the game.

After the first, Dinges retired nine of the next 11 WFC batters and finished allowing three hits and struck out eight.

“We’ve had that happen a couple times where we don’t come out and throw strikes in the first inning so maybe we need to change up our pregame pen routine,” St. Bede coach Bill Booker said. “It was a tough first, but he really came back out after that and threw the ball very well.”

The Bruins (9-6, 3-0) took control for good in the second by scoring six runs, including a three-run double off the bat of Burr and RBIs from Saini and AJ Hermes.

St. Bede added two runs in the third, one on an RBI single from Riva. It then plated seven runs in the fourth with Saini and Riva smacking two-run singles, and Drew Carboni and Hermes also driving in runs.

Riva finished with three hits and five RBIs, while Saini drove in three runs and Hermes two. St. Bede finished with 13 hits as a team and drew nine walks off three WFC pitchers.

“I thought our approach at the plate was really good all game,” Booker said. “After the second inning, we gave the kids the green light and they all stayed disciplined, stayed patient and swung at good pitches.”

After a solid opening inning at the plate, WFC struggled to get much going the final three innings.

“The one thing this team will do is swing the bat,” WFC coach Dan Essman said, his squad falling to 0-8 overall and 0-7 in TCC play. “St. Bede got us for three runs to start the game but then we came back in our half of the first and drew some walks and mixed in a couple hits to get back even. We talk a lot about putting the ball in play and we did that three times in the first and every time something good happened.

“We’re down a couple pitchers down with injuries and we struggled on the mound today. Like we have all season, we are just putting whatever guys that we have available out there every game and working on getting better. St. Bede really hit the ball well.

“We’ll just keep on working to improve as we go.”

St. Bede is scheduled back in action Friday when it plays East Dubuque at LumberKings Stadium in Clinton. WFC is off until Monday when it hosts Putnam County.