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EDWARDSVILLE – The Metro East Bears built up a lot of momentum going undefeated in five games in winning the Ron Bone-Ray Abernathy Invitational tournament in Jefferson County, Mo., over the weekend.
They kept that momentum going Monday night as Tyler Lewis and Tate Wargo combined for a three-hit shutout as the Bears defeated Jerseyville 3-0 at SIU-Edwardsville's Roy Lee Field, running their record to 15-4 on the year; Jerseyville fell to 2-6 on the season.
“Tyler did a real good job for us over at Highland (last week),” said Bears manager Ken Schaake. “He had a little struggle with the control, but once he gets the ball over the plate, he's got good stuff.
“Same thing over at Highland – Tate comes in and finishes it off for us; he's a competitor out there too. That's the good thing – Tate plays at Gillespie and maybe didn't get a lot of recognition up there, but he comes down here and does a good job for us.”
“We hung with them there – we just couldn't get a hit with two outs,” said Jerseyville manager Darren Perdun. “We struck out way too much, didn't put the ball in play, but give the two guys on the mound a lot of credit for a lot of that. We couldn't seem to square up when we needed to.
“We had chances, we had baserunners; we played pretty good defense ourselves and pitched well. There was a time or two where we walked a few guys and they can come back and hurt you; that's kind of what did it today. Other than that, it was a pretty clean ball game both ways.”
The Bears got some big hits when they needed them to score their runs. “(Will) Messer got a couple of hits tonight, got the big triple when we needed it and (Blake) Vandiver early in the game went the opposite way with the ball; he's a good hitter to all parts of the field. He had two strikes and gets a double down the line there and turns around, the next time up, he's got a line-drive single into right field.”
The Bears got their first two runs in the bottom of the first when Kade Burns drew a leadoff walk and came around to score when Cole Hansel singled and advanced to second on an error; Vandiver then doubled home Hansel to put the Bears up 2-0. One more run came home in the fourth when Andrew Yancik led off the inning with a single and was chased home on Messer's triple to right-center.
Lewis and Wargo went on to shut Jerseyville down; Lewis had eight strikeouts in four innings of work and struck out the side in the fourth while getting out of a bases-loaded jam to get the win. Wargo also kept Jerseyville at bay, conceding only a one-out triple to Zach Benware with one out in the seventh before retiring the final two batters to preserve the shutout.
Hansel went 1-for-2 with a run scored for the Bears, with Vandiver 2-for-2 with a double and RBI, Steven Patten 1-for-2 and Messer 2-for-2 with a triple and RBI. John Collins was 1-for-3 for Jerseyville, Jon Woelfel was 1-for-2 and Benware 1-for-3 with the triple in the seventh. Griffin Nash took the loss for Jerseyville, fanning one in 4.2 innings of work; Benware tossed the last 1.1 innings.
The Bears host Highland at 8 p.m. today, then travel to Belleville for a game against the Hilgards at Whitey Herzog Field at 8 p.m. Wednesday.
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Feeney, 56, is a native of Granite City and graduated from Granite City South in 1978. He was a part-time writer for the old Granite City Journal from 1979-84 before attending Eastern Illinois University in Charleston,
from which he earned his BA in journalism in 1988. He has worked for newspapers in Sikeston, Mo., Rocky Mount, N.C., Seneca, S.C. and in Charleston-Mattoon. He also worked for the old St. Clair County Suburban
Journals.
