BELOIT—Owen West knows it isn’t as simple as waving a magic wand and simply making a bad inning disappear.
Still, the Beloit Memorial senior can’t help wondering what could have been after a six-run, error-filled opening frame helped propel the Janesville Craig baseball team past the Purple Knights 9-3 in non-conference action on Monday evening at Pohlman Field.
“You erase that first inning and we’re in it,” West said. “We play clean baseball and stay awake, I think it's a way different game. We were in it other than that.”
The Cougars (12-6), a former Big Eight rival of the Knights before Beloit moved to the Southern Lakes Conference, started the game with a pair of walks before Charlie Claas ripped a single past third baseman Mike Nora that scored one runner and a fumble by left fielder Tayvon Cates scored a second.
Nick Gregg ripped a double to center field to make it 3-0 and another run came home when catcher Dustin Foss overthrew second base trying to throw out a stealing Gregg.
An RBI sacrifice bunt by Carson McCormick scored a fifth run and Tyler Horkan executed a double steal of home plate to up it to 6-0.
“That’s on me,” Beloit head coach Steven Johnson said of the rocky start. “I have to do a better job preparing these guys to start the game. Innings two through seven, we're playing inning to inning with them. (Janesville) is ranked number 13 in the state in Division 1, and we're run for run. We're proving that we can play.”
Knights’ starter Ruddy Ramirez settled in on the mound and allowed just three runs on four hits the rest of the way. He finished with five walks, three in the first frame, nine runs (five earned) on seven hits with a strikeout in 5 2-3 innings.
“Rudy is a competitor and he wants to overpower them,” Johnson said. “That didn't work in the first inning. The last few innings that he pitched, he out-finessed them. And that made a difference. He started throwing strikes.”
Ramirez worked around a two-out single in the second and a one-out hit batter in the third while limiting his opposition to single runs in three other innings.
The Cougars scored in the fourth after Paul Platts tripled and scored on Ryan Lemm’s sacrifice fly, made it 8-2 on Anthony Greco’s RBI double in the fifth and added another run off an error in the sixth.
It was a big bounceback win for Janesville after what head coach Josh Shere described as a “gut-wrenching” 6-4 loss to crosstown rival Parker on Saturday.
“That was honestly one of our worst played games,” he added. “We just didn't execute at all. So, it was really good to see the guys come out and compete and to execute again. Sometimes the best medicine is just to get back out on the field.”
The Knights’ scored two runs in the second inning as Max Allen reached on an error and came around to score when Dustin Foss smacked a double over the left fielder. Foss later came around to score on a passed ball.
Beloit (1-12) cut it to 8-3 in the fifth after Nora singled, went to second on a wild pitch and later scored on West’s single up the middle.
“We’re right there,” West said. “We just gotta stay in it and keep our energy high, that’s all it really takes. Because sometimes we are caught sleeping, and then that's how we get run ruled.”
But Beloit’s bats were mostly held in check by Blake Bowdich, who threw six innings and allowed just three runs (two earned) on four hits with four strikeouts.
“Super proud of Blake,” Shere said. “His opportunities this year have been few and far between. He's usually in games where we're down runs and he's always been able to keep us in there. For his first varsity start, he did fantastic. He threw a lot of strikes with his curveball.”
West threw the final two innings, stranding a runner at third in relief of Ramirez in the sixth and stranding a runner in the seventh on a nice double-play by first baseman Mitch Stuessey, who nabbed a line drive and picked off pinch-runner Nolan Hanel.
The senior center fielder also made a slew of nice grabs in the outfield as Beloit, despite the miscues, made some great defensive plays.
“We’re having fun flying around,” West said. “We just gotta keep our energy up. It correlates to hitting, and hitting also correlates to fielding
The Knights (1-9 in Southern Lakes’ Conference action) will try to snap a five-game losing streak when they face third-place Union Grove (16-4, 8-2) on Tuesday and Friday. They then finish with two games against first-place Westosha Central (17-3, 10-0) next week.
But after falling just 4-2 to second-place Badger (17-3, 8-2) on Saturday, Johnson knows what’s possible.
“It's not that we have our backs against the wall, but we can surprise people,” he said. “We just need to get a good first inning.”
• LINESCORE:
JANESVILLE CRAIG 9, BELOIT MEMORIAL 3
JC 600 111 0 — 9 7 1
BM 020 010 0 — 3 4 4
Leading hitters: JC, Platts 1x3, 2 Runs, 1 Run; Claas 2x4, 1 RBI, 1 Run; Gregg 1x2, 1 RBI, 2 Runs; Dillon 1x3, 1 Run; Horkan 1x3, 1 Run. BM, Foss 1x3, 1 RBI, 1 Run; West 1x3, 1 RBI; Nora 1x3, 1 Run.
Pitching (ip-h-r-er-bb-so): JC, Bowdich 6.0-4-3-2-1-4, Greene 1.0-0-0-0-0-0. BM, Ramirez 5.2-7-9-5-5-1, West 1.1-1-0-0-0-0.
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