Baseball: Brett Bounds crafts masterpiece for Morris in win over Joliet Catholic

WASHINGTON — Morris’ Brett Bounds was so focused on executing his pitching plan against Joliet Catholic in the Class 3A Washington Sectional championship game Friday that during his team’s at-bats he went outside of the dugout and tossed a ball at the dugout wall just to keep his form.

Bounds 100-pitch effort (which didn’t include the 50 or so throws he fired at the wall) was nearly perfect as he scattered five hits in a shutout for Morris as it earned a 7-0 victory over the Hilltoppers.

“We were just prepared. We know a Catholic League opponent it’s always going to be a great game,” Bounds said. “Coach [Todd] Kein has us prepared and juiced us up, coming into a big rivalry game like this one.

“I couldn’t ask for a better ending. I felt like I just had confidence in my defense all day and we hit the ball when we got runners in scoring position. Just to come through when it counts, it feels great.”

The win lifts Morris (27-3) into Monday’s 6 p.m. Geneseo Supersectional, where it will face Sycamore, a 1-0 winner over Burlington Central in 12 innings Friday night. Morris is one step away from making its first state tournament appearance since its 1994 title team.

Joliet Catholic closed its season at 29-6. The Hilltoppers were aiming to win three consecutive state titles, having won Class 2A crowns in both 2022 and 2023. The IHSA’s success formula moved Joliet Catholic up to the Class 3A field because of those consecutive titles.

Kein still was marveling at the performance of Bounds several minutes after the game.

“It just ended a few minutes ago, but it’s already to me just a memorable performance,” Kein said. “I couldn’t be prouder of him than I am. The way he took the ball today and took on one of the top teams in Illinois and said, “Not Today.”.

Bounds faced the minimum through the first eight batters of the game before allowing a double to John O’Brien with two outs in the third. He stranded him there and allowed just one runner to reach third base over the course of the entire game.

“I was able to locate all four pitches for strikes whenever I wanted,” Bounds said. “It’s just nice to have that four-pitch mix that I can rely on.”

The Morris attack, which has been potent all season, took awhile to find its groove.

Morris put up two runs in the second but had just one hit, a double by Cody Del Favero in the inning, but a pair of Joliet Catholic errors extended the inning and allowed Morris to push across those runs.

Morris wouldn’t get another hit until the fifth, but it wasn’t until the sixth inning that the flood gates finally opened. Morris rapped six hits in the inning and scored four runs. Morris finally broke through with a two-run double with AJ Zweeres.

“I’m not trying to sound arrogant or anything like that, but there was not a doubt in my mind that the bats were going to come through,” Kein said. “It was just a matter of when.”

It was rough all around for Joliet Catholic, most notably defensively. The Hilltoppers committed five errors in the game and had a few other potentially exceptional defensive plays that weren’t quite completed.

The Hilltoppers also had only one inning, the third, when it sent more than four batters to the plate.