Good pitching will always beat good hitting.
Although it is a clich?, it still holds true today. The fact is that a dominant pitcher can control even the most potent offense.
For the Billiken baseball team, there has been at least one pitcher step up and dominate in every conference series. Last weekend, the Bills had superb pitching from every member of the staff.
Tuesday night, the Billiken staff came up with another quality start. As junior hurler Brad Wehrfritz took the mound against Bradley, the Billikens were looking to climb to within one game of .500.
Wehrfritz came through with another quality performance, giving up just two earned runs in six innings. Then, it was sophomore Dan Parker who came on and got the unconventional three-inning save.
For Parker, it was his best outing of the year. He didn’t allow a hit or walk in his three innings of work. He was able to keep the Braves off balance with his sinking fastball and good curveball. Parker’s control was reassuring, as he has had problems spotting his pitches up to this point in the year.
The 6-3 win propelled the Billikens to an 18-19 record on the year.
Prior to the victory over the Braves, the Bills took two of three from South Florida over the weekend. The victories over South Florida pushed the Bills up to fifth in conference, with a 7-8 conference record.
In the Friday night game it was senior Dan Shouse who came up with the dominating pitching performance. Shouse was masterful, only allowing four hits and one earned run in his complete game outing.
Shouse said, “I threw my game instead of trying to throw to their hitters’ weaknesses. I just tried to relax and not overthrow my pitches. I was able to get ahead with my fastball and then could use my changeup and slider to effectively get people out.”
It was Shouse’s best performance of the year and was reminiscent of the multiple quality outings he had last year.
The difference, however, was that in this game the Billiken offense gave Shouse enough run support to provide him with the win.
“I just have to throw what I can and allow our defense and hitters to do their jobs so that we can pick up the win,” said Shouse.
In the Saturday affair, it was junior Wes Jaillet who went eight innings and allowed three earned runs. Going into the ninth inning, the Billikens trailed the Bulls 4-2.
The comeback began in the bottom of the ninth, when senior Brandon Shockley singled. Sophomores Andrew Slania and Steve Moss both followed with hits and the Billikens loaded the bases.
Then, the top of the order came to the plate, in the form of junior Kurt Evans.
Evans drew a bases-loaded walk and pushed the score to 4-3. Then, senior two-hitter, Paul Miles, fouled out for the second out of the frame. With the Bills down to their last out a wild pitch allowed the fourth Billiken run to score.
With the winning run on third base senior second baseman Nick Steiner had a great at bat and finally singled to right-centerfield. Steiner’s single plated the Bills fifth run and got the Bills their seventh conference win of the year.
On Sunday, the Bills weren’t able to mount a second ninth inning rally, as they fell 5-4 to the Bulls. The Sunday game was a well-played game in which the Bills didn’t get the breaks they needed.
Coach Bob Hughes said, “It would have been nice to get the sweep, but we weren’t able to do it. We had opportunities; in the fourth we had the bases loaded and nobody out, but couldn’t produce any runs. Getting out of that jam seemed to really energize their club and get them back in the game.”
It was more bad luck for the Billikens in the seventh, as a routine groundball with two outs hit something in the field and bounced over the shortstop’s head.
“That was just bad luck, Paul would have picked that ball with no problem, and we would have been out of the inning. The baseball gods just weren’t with us on Sunday,” said Hughes.
The Billiken ninth-inning rally fell just short, as Steiner hit a deep fly ball that looked to have the distance to get out of the park for a game-winning three-run homer, but it fell just short and was caught on the warning track.
This weekend the Billikens play host to the Cincinnati Bearcats. Both teams are 7-8 in conference and are tied for fifth place. The series this weekend is going to play a major factor in the way that the conference standings shape up, as the Bills head down the stretch.
“This is the biggest weekend of the year for us so far,” said Shouse.
Coach Hughes agreed as he said, “This is a good place to be in; our destiny is in our own hands. We have a chance to put some distance between us and the other teams.”
The series with Cincinnati kicks off Friday night at 7 p.m., and each of the weekend games is at 1 p.m.
On Wednesday at 7 p.m., the Bills will play their makeup game with Missouri at the T.R. Hughes ballpark in O’Fallon, Mo.
