There were different methods to the success on the mound in Monday’s nonconference matchup.

For St. Charles North, it relied on a strong start on the mound from Ben Auer, along with some solid defense.

For Burlington Central, it focused on quantity, a different pitcher being used for every inning.

And by the end of the seventh inning, no team could pull ahead, as the game was called due to darkness and finished in a 1-1 tie.

“That’s a good team there, and we love to play them,” North Stars coach Todd Genke said. “The elements were not ideal for hitting. But we felt like we had enough opportunities to try to pull it out.”

The North Stars (6-2-1) had a chance to put the game away in the bottom of the seventh inning. Mason Netcel scored the tying run after a throwing error on a sacrifice bunt from Nolan Macholz. But with runners on first and second and no outs, the Rockets got a pickoff at second base before Brayden Hines shut the door with a pop fly and strikeout.

“Anytime you play in a tight game, baserunning plays a huge part in it, and we just made some mistakes that can’t be made,” Genke said. “We’ve got to run the bases better, and that’s been an emphasis for us.”

The score came after the Rockets (3-3-2) put the first run on the board in the top half of the seventh. After loading up bases with two outs, Wagner Viebrok beat out an infield single to score Thomas Koertgen.

“He’s been struggling a bit at the plate lately, so I was happy for him,” Rockets coach Kyle Nelson said. “He’s a good ball player and good hitter. It’s tough early in the season, having a couple bad games, you feel like your whole season’s over, but that’s a huge hit for him.”

The seventh inning was just the second time the Rockets got a player in scoring position, a lot in part from the pitching performance from Auer, who finished the game allowing just one hit and two walks while striking out seven over 5⅓ innings.

“I just had a lot of adrenaline heading into the home opener,” Auer said. “The body felt great, arm felt great and stuff was working. I did my best to be efficient and pound the zone.”

Auer led the North Stars in the box as well, joining Charlie Major as the only players with two hits on the day. But the lack of stringing hits together proved to be not enough to help him get the win on the mound.

“It’s tough to settle for a tie, especially against a team that struggled offensively against us,” Auer said. “It all comes down to execution. At the end of the day, I personally and the guys have to execute better games, since this is the type of game that will come up in June.”

A lot of that was thanks to the Rockets switching up who was on the mound every inning. Central finished the game using eight separate pitchers.

“The original plan was just to use seven, to be honest,” Nelson said. “We start (Fox Valley) conference play soon, and we only played Saturday last week, so we had a bunch of guys who hadn’t thrown, so we wanted to keep them all fresh.”

The Rockets managed to pitch themselves out of two bases-loaded jams in the game, with Ashton Binz getting a groundout to end the fourth inning, while Tyler Kotwica entered the game with two outs in the sixth and got Auer to strike out to escape the jam.

“I’m proud of all the pitchers that went up there,” Nelson said. “Not all of them had 1-2-3 innings, but they wiggled out of some situations and made big pitches against some good hitters.”

It was the second tie the Rockets have had against a DuKane Conference team this season, with them drawing an 11-11 tie against Batavia on March 25.

“I feel like a soccer coach,” Nelson said. “This is my 23rd year, I’ve only had one tie before this season and now we have two. It’s definitely different.”