Eagles win ugly with walk-off slam

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ADDISON -- In a seven-game postseason spread over three weeks, sometimes an ugly win is necessary for a team to reach its goal of a state championship. The Aurora Christian Eagles are hoping that Wednesday's 9-7 extra-inning victory over Walther Lutheran in the Driscoll Sectional semifinal is that game for them.

The Broncos (21-16) consistently had men on base by knocking out 13 hits, drawing four walks, reaching on three errors and scoring on one wild pitch, but the Eagles (24-10) were able to overcome it all in the bottom of the eighth on a walk-off grand slam by Eric Andersen.

"We didn't deserve to win as far as I'm concerned," Eagles coach Andy Zorger said. "We made errors we haven't been making, made some poor decisions and had our emotions get the best of us. Our guys haven't done that all year, but at the same time we gave ourselves a chance in the last inning."

The winning home run was set up by singles by Andru Ubert and Mitch Holtz and an error by Broncos third baseman Josh Easter that allowed Nate Hill to reach safely.

Andersen then took care of the rest off of tiring Walther starter Steve Swiderek.

"Anytime you're down you just have to dink and dunk and get whatever you could get," Andersen said of the climactic inning. "We were thinking this kid's at 125 pitches and he's going to throw a lot of junk and I was just fortunate that he threw me a fastball middle-in and I hit it over."

The Eagles took a 4-1 lead in the second inning, but Swiderek held ACS to just a Matt Morse home run over the next five innings.

That allowed the Broncos to chip away at ACS starter David Zielke, as they scored one run in the third, fourth, fifth and top of the seventh to send it to extra innings at 5-5.

But Walther Lutheran let many opportunities slip away on the basepaths and in the field.

"We had three guys thrown out on bases and the third baseman dropped the ball three times (in the bottom of the eighth)," Broncos coach Don Gillingham said. "It's hard to win like that."

The Broncos did take a 7-5 lead in the top of the eighth off Ubert as errors by Hill and second baseman Zac Copple allowed David Tuomi to drive in two runs with a single.

But Walther repaid them with the biggest error of the game a half-inning later.

"When you get an opportunity, you really have to just grab hold of that," Andersen said. "This is as far as we've ever been so we don't know anything better, so it's fun. But our minds are set for Saturday. We're just rolling right now."

Baseball: Class 2A Driscoll Sectional