Baseball: Pitching leads La Salle-Peru to late-night finish, sweep of Ottawa

OTTAWA – The La Salle-Peru baseball team used a combined effort on the mound by starter Mason Lynch and reliever Josh Senica to defeat Interstate Eight Conference host Ottawa, 5-1, in cold and windy conditions Monday night at King Field.

Lynch, after allowing three walks in the first, retired 13 of the next 14 batters he faced and went the opening five innings, allowing only one hit and fanning 11. Senica, who earned the save, retired six of the seven batters he faced with a walk and three punchouts.

“I thought Mason Lynch did an excellent job for us tonight,” said L-P coach Matt Glupczynski, his team now 11-8 overall and 6-3 in league action after a two-game sweep of Ottawa. “He gave us five solid innings, had good tempo, pounded the strike zone and forced Ottawa to put the ball in play. We all know that guys really don’t like to hit in conditions like tonight, so it’s important to be in the strike zone a lot, and Mason, as well as Josh, were able to do that.

“The name of the game is pitching and defense, especially when the weather is cold. In these types of situations, you can’t set the table for your opponents with a ton of walks, and after the opening inning we did a great job with that. You also want to keep your fielders awake, and throwing strikes does that.

“At the plate we were able to put together some pretty good at-bats in situations when we needed them.”

La Salle-Peru scored in the first inning when Seth Adams coaxed a walk from Pirates starting and losing pitcher Jack Olson (5+ IP, 2 ER, 7 K), moved to third on Julius Sanchez’s double to the fence in right-center, and scored on a groundout by Aiden Van Duzer.

The Cavs added a run in the second as Lynch reached on an infield single, stole second, went to third on a passed ball and scored on a base hit by Brady Romangonli.

The Pirates got one back in the third. Daniel Bruner tripled to the gap in right and later scored on a passed ball to make it 2-1.

Then in the top of the seventh, the visitors scored three insurance runs. Adams singled to center against reliever Bruner to start the inning, followed by a walk to Sanchez. After Aiden Van Duzer sacrificed the runners up 90 feet and Brendan Boudreau was walked intentionally, Senica drilled a double to right-center to score two before coming home himself on a single by Lynch.

“Getting one hit isn’t going to get it done most of the time, and add to that striking out 15-16 times. ...” said Ottawa coach Tyler Wargo, his team now 11-5 and 5-3. “La Salle-Peru battled at the plate better than we did tonight. They would battle and then put the ball in play, where when we did battle, it seemed to end up in a strikeout. We didn’t have very many good approaches, and were swinging at pitches we don’t normally swing at. Not being able to cash in that very first inning was tough, but we didn’t.

“We talk to all of our pitchers about making competitive misses. I feel like the two games with L-P, our misses were so wide that we didn’t give their hitters a chance to make a decision.

“This is just one of those games where you tip your cap to the opponent. But will be better on the mound and at the plate come Wednesday.”

Both teams are back in league action at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday with Ottawa hosting Plano and La Salle-Peru traveling to Sandwich.