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JOHNSBURG – Woodstock pitcher Gavin Loiselle viewed the gusting winds of more than 40 mph Thursday afternoon as just another day at the office.
“There’s been a lot of outings I’ve had where the weather hasn’t been great,” Loiselle said. “Last week against Grant it was similiar. That preparation helped me do well today.”
Loiselle turned in his sharpest outing of the season, a three-hit, six-strikeout performance, as the Blue Streaks downed Johnsburg, 13-3, in five innings in their Kishwaukee River Conference baseball game at Hiller Park.
Woodstock (6-4, 4-1 KRC) got its offense going in the third inning, then had big innings in the fourth and fifth to end the game early. Loiselle allowed only one infield hit through four innings and gave up two earned runs.
“For sure it’s his best outing,” Blue Streaks coach Matt Prill said. “He’s had a couple outings where it’s been challenging weather. This is far and away his best. He got out ahead of hitters, putting himself in a position to be aggressive in the count, for sure.”
Loiselle threw 93 pitches and struck out two Skyhawks in each of the fourth and fifth innings.
“There were definitely adjustments I had to make, seeing how the wind was going to take my offspeed pitches, how [the wind] was going to move my fastball and how to set up on the mound,” Loiselle said. “All in all I had a pretty good outing. There are still things I can improve on with my offspeed, but even though that wasn’t working today, I had good command over my fastball and it helped the team win, so that’s all I wanted to do.”
Woodstock scored two runs in the third for a 2-1 lead, then pushed five across in the fourth. Leadoff man Sam Chapman had a 10-foot double in that inning when a wind-blown pop-up found the grass ahead of home plate, eluding diving Skyhawks catcher Alex Delulio.
The Streaks’ No. 2 hitter Travis Cote doubled in a run in the third and singled in two more in the fourth.
“We wanted to maintain our approach and not try to do too much with the pitch,” Prill said. “They stayed within themselves the entire game.”
Johnsburg fell to 4-7, 3-3 in the KRC. Woodstock is one game behind Richmond-Burton in the league standings.
“We had an approach to put the ball in play,” Cote said. “If we put the ball in the air it’s going to go places they don’t expect.
“We haven’t let up many runs. We’ve been playing good defense, hitting when we need to and putting the ball in play a lot. Just hitting when we need to in clutch situations.”
Brady Heeren and Hayden Haak each had two hits and one RBI. Caden Monti singled in two runs in the fifth that ultimately finished the game with the 10-run rule.
“Every game we played, (Loiselle) was intense,” Skyhawks coach Mark Landvick said. “I remember in wrestling he was the same way, he’s got that mentality. He played great first base the other day against us. He’s a big dude, he’s strong and he works hard.”
Jake Metze singled in the fifth for Johnsburg’s only RBI.
“We did not hit,” Landvick said. “Our at-bats were great in the first two innings and then started to fall apart. We had some me-me-me play and not enough we-we-we play and guys got down and couldn’t get out of that hole.”
Woodstock 13, Johnsburg 3 (5 inn.)
Woodstock 002 56 – 13 9 1
Johnsburg 100 11 – 3 3 4
WP: Gavin Loiselle (5IP, 3H, 3R, 2ER, 2BB, 6K). LP: Jacob Lamotta (3.2IP, 5H, 7R, 6ER, 1BB, 4K).
Top hitters–Woodstock: Sam Chapman 1-3 (2B, RBI), Travis Cote 2-4 (2B, 3RBIs, 2R), Caden Monti 1-3 (2RBIs), Brady Heeren 2-3 (RBI), Hayden Haak 2-2 (RBI). Johnsburg: Jake Metze 1-3 (RBI).