Providence rallies in final two innings against Minooka to win record 6th WJOL Tournament title

JOLIET – Despite all the rain and postponements during the WJOL Tournament, the weather held up Saturday for the championship game between Providence Catholic and Minooka. Like the weather this week, it was filled with ups and downs.

After a disastrous fourth inning for Providence Catholic put the Celtics behind by four runs, they rallied in the final two innings to win 12-4 and earn their record sixth WJOL Tournament title.

Providence (5-1) had just three hits entering the sixth inning and finished with 11. More critically, they finished with eight walks, all in the final two innings to aid the comeback. It was a nice turnaround for the defending Class 4A state champs after a bit of a rough start.

“I just told them to keep swinging,” coach Mark Smith said. “This is our sixth game, and we really haven’t swung the bats very well this year. We saw very good pitching today, and it’s so early in the year. It was chilly out, and it finally clicked [in the sixth].”

Blake Jenner (2 for 3, three RBIs, two runs), Sammy Atkinson (three RBIs) and Mason Almazan (two RBIs) led the way for the Celtics. Five pitchers combined to strikeout seven, allowing five hits and two earned runs.

“We went through it last year where we were down in the playoffs a lot,” Jenner said. “We knew four runs wasn’t that much. We have nine guys in the order that can get it done at any time. As long as we get the guys on base we’ll figure out a way to win.”

For the Indians (7-1), it was their first setback of the season after an undefeated start. That included impressive wins over Joliet Catholic and Lockport. It was a strong effort early with CJ Deckinga notching a pair of RBIs in the fourth.

It was also a brilliant start for Zane Caves, who struck out eight. He gave up just three hits and three earned runs, one before being pulled with two outs in the sixth. Three runs scored after he left, and another eight went on the scoreboard in the seventh between more two Indian pitchers.

“I’ve done this a long time and that was one of the bigger implosions that I’ve seen,” Minooka coach Jeff Petrovic said. “We had two outs and nobody on, and we had 10 runs we gave up to get four outs which is pretty rough. There were a lot of free bases we gave them. ... You’re not going to win 35 games in a year, you just hope the kids learn something from it.”

The bright side for Minooka is that their first loss didn’t come until the championship game of the WJOL Tournament. It was a rough day, but Caves was confident the team would be able to turn it around.

“Our coaches talked about how we have to pick up Monday and start off right,” Caves said. “We can’t let this cause trouble with our season. We have five games next week so we just have to get past it and keep rolling.”

As for the Celtics, they knocked off a pair of undefeated teams on the same day. Yet both Smith and Jenner said they weren’t satisfied with the start they’ve had this year.

“We’re confident, but we have to improve on a lot of things,” Jenner said. “We’ve got to stop making routine errors. We can’t get untimely outs, and we’ve got to stop trying to do too much.”

Due to weather this week, both teams were playing their second contest of the day. The semifinals had been pushed back from Friday to Saturday morning. That began with Providence beating Plainfield Central 4-2. Enzo Infelise led with a two-run homer and was 2 for 4 at the plate. Minooka made it past Lockport 8-3 in the second game with Brayden Zillis hitting two home runs.