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McHENRY – McHenry left-hander Lleyton Grubich combined two effective pitches with a large dose of confidence to silence Jacobs.
The senior allowed two hits over six innings, fanned seven and retired 10 consecutive hitters at one point as McHenry defeated Jacobs, 10-1, in their Fox Valley Conference game Friday at Petersen Park.
Catcher Cooper Cohn delivered a big blow, a two-out, three-run home run in the second, to ignite the Warriors’ offense. That proved to be plenty of runs for Grubich, who alternated between his fastball and slider to earn the win.
“I could locate [the slider] for first-pitch strikes and was able to get some kids to swing,” Grubich said. “I just felt comfortable and felt good on the mound. You have to attack guys early so they’re guessing and swing over the cutter or slider. Make them guess. The weather was great. My pitches were working.”
[ Photos: McHenry vs. Jacobs baseball ]
Cohn liked the way his pitcher competed against the Golden Eagles (7-2, 2-1 FVC). Jacobs beat Crystal Lake South, 7-5, earlier Friday, then drove to McHenry to take on the Warriors (4-4, 2-3).
“He’s a great competitor,” Cohn said. “He’s come a long way. And getting to work with him, I catch him a lot, and we work well together. He got out there and dominated.
“He didn’t need the changeup much. The fastball was coming out nice. We worked four-seam, two-seam. He had some of the best stuff he’s had so far.”
Ricky Powell and Grubich walked to start the second, but Jacobs starter Grant Helbig was close to avoiding damage when he struck out Logan Wirtz and Kyle Kaempf.
Cohn was looking fastball and jumped on the first pitch, ripping a shot just inside the left-field foul pole.
“I did a double-take. I started to run and didn’t know it was going to stay in,” Cohn said. “It felt good to finally get one. It gave us a little cushion. We were only up one at that time. It took a little weight off our shoulders, and we were able to relax. We had runners in scoring position and two guys came up short, and it relieved everybody.”
The Warriors added three more runs the next inning, although Helbig struck out the side in both the second and third, and pushed the lead to 7-0.
“That [homer] was huge for us,” Warriors coach Brian Rockweiler said. “To have Cooper come up after a couple guys get out and hit that home run, that was a big turning point in the game. It definitely gave us a lot of momentum.”
Rockweiler admired how Grubich battled against one of the FVC’s top teams.
“He threw his fastball really well today and had good bite on his slider,” he said. “I was more proud of the fact that he had a couple bad at-bats, he was 0 for 3, but he didn’t take it to the mound. He just focused. I don’t know if last year that would have happened, but this year he knows he’s on the mound and that’s his main focus.”
After issuing a leadoff walk in the second, Grubich set down the next 10 Eagles he faced. Keegan Connors lined a single up the middle in the fifth to score Jacobs’ only run.
“Credit to McHenry, they came out and swung it,” Eagles coach Jamie Murray said. “We got beat up a little bit, but that’s baseball. You bounce back, it’s a long season. We have a lot of games coming up. We have to flush it and move on. Grubich did a nice job, got our guys off-balance. They did a better job than us today.”
McHenry 10, Jacobs 1
Jacobs 000 010 0 – 1 3 1
McHenry 133 102 x – 10 10 2
WP: Lleyton Grubich (6IP, 2H, 1R, 1ER, 3BB, 7K). LP: Grant Helbig (3IP, 4H, 7R, 7ER, 5BB, 7K).
Top hitters–Jacobs: Keegan Connors 2-3 (RBI). McHenry: Cooper Cohn 1-3 (HR, 4RBIs), Connor Rodgers 1-2 (2R), Eddie Synek 1-3 (2B, R), Ricky Powell 3-3 (RBI, 3R), Logan Wirtz 1-3 (RBI).