Baseball: Morris takes out frustrations in big win over Coal CIty

MORRIS – On Thursday, Morris was on the wrong end of a controversial decision and suffered a loss to Ottawa.

Morris was off on Friday, giving the team a rest before taking out its anger.

Coal City was the unfortunate recipient of Morris’ frustrations, and Morris proved to be rude hosts in the annual neighborhood matchup. Cody Del Favero led a 14-hit Morris offense, going 4 for 4 with five runs batted in, including a three-run homer in the bottom of the fourth that ended the game via the 15-run rule by a 17-2 score.

“I was seeing the ball pretty well today,” Del Favero said. “On the home run, I got a low fastball. I like to hit those.

“After the Ottawa game, we realized that we need to pick things up at the start of the game and do better early.”

Morris (10-3) did not score in the bottom of the first, but picked things up quickly after that. In the bottom of the second, Nazim Baftiri led off with a double and Anthony Xydakis followed with a walk. Starting pitcher Keegan Waters reached on throwing error on a grounder to third that allowed Baftiri to come home with the first run of the game and sending Xydakis to third. Caston Norris (2 for 2) then laid down a squeeze bunt for a single that scored Xydakis. An infield single to third by AJ Zweeres loaded the bases. After a liner to short, Jack Wheeler hit a grounder to third for a fielder’s choice, allowing courtesy runner Lorenzo Zdanwic to score. Del Favero followed with an infield single to short to plate Zweeres. Del Favero then stole second and Griffin Zweeres (2 for 3, 3 RBIs) singled to left to score both Wheeler and Del Favero for a 6-0 lead.

The Morris offense showed no mercy to the next Coal City pitcher in the next inning. Xydakis led off the inning with a solo home run to left before Waters reached on error. Zdanwic was caught stealing, but Norris, AJ Zweeres and Bounds all walked to load the bases for Wheeler. The Illinois commit doubled to right, scoring both Norris and Zweeres and sending Bounds to third. Del Favero then singled to left to score both Wheeler and Bounds, taking second on the throw home. Griffin Zweeres followed with a single that chased home Del Favero for a 12-0 lead.

Waters, a Wisconsin-Parkside recruit who is still on the comeback trail from an injury, ran into some trouble in the top of the fourth. Coal City’s Lance Cuddy led off the inning with a double before Austin Davy walked. A grounder to first by Creide Skubic moved the runners up a base and the Coalers (9-3) got back-to-back RBI singles from AJ Wills and Danny Olson before Waters got out of the inning with two groundouts.

“It was nice to see Keegan on the mound,” Morris coach Todd Kein said. “We wanted to stretch him out a little and he threw around 70 pitches. I’m glad he faced a little adversity there in his last inning. He got tired and he felt it. He needs to push himself to get to where he can give us 100 pitches. We know he will, and there was a sense of calm from both the team and coaching staff just seeing him on the mound.

“There’s no way around the fact that our guys have had an emotional couple of days. Since the other day in Ottawa, they have been itching to get back on the field and unleash some demons. Nothing against Coal City, because they are going to have a good year when it’s all said and done, but our guys had some aggressions to take out.”

Morris finished it off with five runs in the bottom of the fourth. Pinch-hitter AJ Franzetti led off with a double and went to third on a single by Norris. A single to left by AJ Zweeres scored Frandezzi before Bounds singled to center to score Norris. An out later, Del Favero launched a homer onto Union Street in right to cap the scoring.

“Cody has made a lot of improvement on his two-strike approach,” Kein said. “It’s something he has been working on and it stands out to me. Griffin Zweeres just drives in runs. He has settled into the fifth spot in our order and is doing a great job. It was nice to see Caston Norris at No. 9 turn the lineup over the way he did, being on base all three times.”

It was the end of a long week for Coal City, which was playing its sixth game of the week and was very short on pitching entering the contest.

“Two of the guys who threw today hadn’t pitched an inning all year,” Coal City coach Greg Wills said. “One of them didn’t pitch at all last year, either. But we knew coming in that pitching was going to be a problem today.

“I am proud of our guys in that they didn’t quit. We kept at it and put up a couple of runs against a guy that’s going to pitch in college. It was a bad situation for us from the get-go, and we didn’t help by giving them extra outs in a couple of innings. Morris is a real good team, and we love playing them. It’s a 20-minute drive, they have a great program and we look forward to this game every year. We usually play them pretty close, but they were too much for us today.”