Taking it to the Matt
JOLIET -- Zak Horvat shot down a runner and shifted the momentum.
Edgar Silva, with one swing of the bat, snapped a 3-3 deadlock in the bottom of the fifth inning. And Matt Porter was his tenacious self in Joliet Township's 8-3 high school baseball victory over Lincoln-Way Central in a SouthWest Suburban Conference crossover on Thursday afternoon.
PHOTOs by john patsch/staff photographer
• Providence improves to 14-0
Central (5-8, 1-4) rallied from a 3-1 deficit to tie the score on back-to-back solo home runs by Nate Dobrez and Aric Marquardt in the top of the third.
Then, in the top of the fifth, the Knights threatened to take the lead after Dobrez doubled. Porter, JT's junior left-hander, made a play to pick off pinch-runner Chris Skiniotes with two outs.
Porter's throw to second was low and ricochetted off Skiniotes' helmet as he slid head-first back to the bag. Skiniotes hopped to his feet and raced to third.
He was waved home by Central coach Marty Dykas as Horvat, JT's senior first baseman, tracked down the ball in shallow right field.
His throw home was dug out of the dirt by JT catcher Mike Hollenbeck. He put the tag on Skiniotes to snuff the Knights' bid to go ahead.
Silva stepped up a minute later and drilled an 0-1 pitch over the fence in left field to put JT on top 4-3. Porter's two-out RBI single extended the margin to 5-3 and the Steelmen (10-5, 3-2) cruised down the home stretch thanks to a three-run homer off the bat of Matt Heizer in the bottom of the sixth.
Porter, the Nick Swisher of high school baseball, batted in his usual leadoff slot and had four hits in five at-bats to fuel JT's offense. He doesn't look the part of a leadoff hitter but he battles in a bulldog fashion true to his persona and works the count until he finally gets a pitch he can hit.
"He's been doing that all year for us in the leadoff spot," JT coach Terry Piazza said. "People look at him -- we had even talked about it early in the year whether we were going to put him in that spot. But, I'll tell you what, he has come through and delivered. He's probably one of our better hitters right now. He's consistently putting the bat on the baseball and making things happen."
The Steelmen outhit the Knights 13-7 on a day when the wind was blowing out and the two teams combined for four home runs. The irony was that Horvat's defensive play charged up every one in the JT dugout.
"We've been preaching defense all year long," Piazza said. "We feel like it's one of our strong points. As long as we continue to play good defense, we're going to continue to be effective and win baseball games. That was huge right there. Instead of coming in down 4-3, you come in and it's a 3-3 tie and we're coming off a big play. Then, 'Bam, right off the bat, we're right back in the lead.' "
"It was a good play by the first baseman," Dykas said. "I took a shot. Obviously, he's out in right field and he has to make a really good throw, and he did it. The catcher made a nice pick on the short hop. Then, the kid leads off with a home run.
"But we're still in the game. You've got to give No. 10 (Porter), their leadoff hitter, credit. He has a great at-bat and on a good pitch goes down and get it. Otherwise, it's only 4-3 and we're out of that jam."
Porter (2-0) was equally impressive on the mound.
After allowing all three Central runs on five hits in the first three innings, he pitched shutout ball the rest of the way. He struck out seven and walked three.
"Well, at first, I wasn't pitching too well," Porter said. "They got some good hits, some big hits. I knew I had to keep the ball down after that. My changeup was really getting them off guard. They were really early on it. They couldn't wait back."
"He struggled early," Piazza said. "He was all around the strike zone. He threw a lot of pitches. Then, he started getting his off-speed stuff in there. He threw a lot of changeups, and we were able to get a lot of outs and get them way out in front of the ball. He battled out there and gave us an opportunity to stay in the baseball game when they had opportunities to get the lead.
"He's a competitor out there. Matt's a guy we want on the mound all the time. We're always looking for him to go seven innings if we can get it out of him. He's never looking to come out of the game. So, he did a helluva job today."
Piazza shouted a word of encouragement to Silva before he ripped a pitch from Central starter Sean Miller (1-3) for his go-ahead homer.
"He was cutting his swing off and pulling out," Piazza said. "Anything on that outside corner, he wasn't going to get. I just told him to extend through the zone and get through the baseball. And, on the very next pitch, he got an opportunity. The ball was right there and he smoked it."
"I just wanted to get on base, do anything that I could," Silva said. "Coach has been screaming at me to put the ball in play. That's what I did."
Silva, Hollenbeck and Heizer each finished with two hits for JT. Heizer's double in the third bounced off the fence in left center. He drove his homer over the fence in right in the sixth off Knights' reliever Brian Hennessy.
"I watched the first pitch go by," Heizer said. "It was a good pitch. I should have jumped on that one. Then, on the next pitch, I stepped in there. He gave me an outside fastball, and I took it the opposite way."
Dobrez led Central with two hits, both of them for extra bases. Danny Murphy also doubled.