For the third and final time of this year’s regular season, the Scouts faced off against Zion-Benton Thursday evening at West Campus. Since the Zee-Bees are currently dead last in the North Suburban Conference and have an ugly win percentage of .211 (4-15), the Scouts needed to win the series to help them move up in the rankings of their conference before postseason play. Thursday evening’s game had a similar feel to Tuesday’s game given the fact that the game stayed rather low scoring with both teams staying within at least two runs of each other throughout the duration of the contest. Jason Cast for the Scouts and Matt Hamlet for the Bees were deemed as the starting pitchers in hopes of leading their team to a series victory.
Both starting pitchers were dominant in the first two innings, but come the third inning, the Zee-Bees struck first. Jason Cast began the third by striking out Joey Loy, but the door was opened for Zion-Benton when Robert Hunt singled to left field and Collin Shiade walked on four pitches. To help maximize the Zee-Bee’s scoring opportunity, Robert Hunt used his speed to steal third base. Right after Hunt stole third base, Brennan Ferguson grounded out to Caleb Durbin at shortstop for the second out, but Hunt had plenty of time to cross the plate, granting Zion-Benton with the early one run lead. Lake Forest failed to answer them in the bottom half of the inning, but the Scouts would not take long to respond to the Zee-Bee’s first run of the night.
After the Scouts turned a gorgeous double play to end Zion-Benton’s chances of extending their lead in the top of the fourth, the Scouts didn’t want to wait any longer to even up the contest. Andrew Gough began the bottom of the fourth with a single to center field, then would proceed to steal second base in the next Scouts at-bat. Jason Cast ended up grounding out to the shortstop which gave the Zee-Bee’s their first out of the inning, but Cast did successfully advance the tying run to 90 feet away from the plate. Right after Matt Hamlet registered his second out of the inning, Ryan Chandler hit a single to right field that easily scored Gough from third base. The Scouts, however, had only briefly tied the game. Zion-Benton would have an answer in the following inning.
The Scouts couldn’t have had a worse start to the fifth inning. Zee-Bee leadoff hitter Joey Loy was plunked on the first pitch of his at-bat by Cast. Following the pitcher’s mistake, Scouts third baseman Johnny Salm committed an error allowing Robert Hunt to reach first base and Loy to move into scoring position. With one out in the inning and the bases loaded because of yet another walk, Logan Bakkia grounded out to second base, allowing Robert Hunt to score. Zion-Benton retook the lead without getting a single hit in the fifth.
After trailing for the second time in the game, the Scouts looked to answer in the bottom of the fifth inning by scoring more than one run. After Ryan Lee grounded out to start the inning, Caleb Durbin got the first hit on a line drive to center field. Following the single, Drew Golde crushed a double to right field, which scored Durbin all the way from first. After the RBI double, Golde stole third base followed by another walk given up by Hamlet. Then, with two outs in the inning, Jason Cast proved that he could do more than just pitch when he reached on an infield single scoring Drew Golde and advancing pinch runner Parker Messner. With the lead, the Scouts were hoping to tag on an insurance run. Before Matt Hamlet got out of the inning, the Zion-Benton third basemen Brandon Ruiz made an error on a pickoff play. Messner was able to score, giving the Scouts a two run lead.
Jason Cast’s terrific outing ended in the 6th inning after he shut out Zion-Benton for the fourth inning of the game. Cast only gave up two runs on three hits along with striking out five Zee-Bee batters. Paul Turelli closed the game in the seventh, showing no mercy to the visiting team. The Scouts ended up winning the game 4-2 and winning the series two games to one. The Scouts offense could have been a little better Thursday evening, but every piece of the Scouts defense was on point keeping Zion from scoring more than a pair of runs.
The Scouts will play their third consecutive home game Friday evening against Glenbrook North at 4:30. From there, next week brings a three game set against NSC-leading Mundelein whom is indisputably one of the better teams in Lake County. With the season well past its halfway point, it is now crunch time for the Scouts as they look to improve their seed for the upcoming playoffs.
