Wildkits Extend Winning Streak To 9 In A Row

Good pitching and good defense can take a baseball team a long way at every level.

Add some length to your batting order, and a winning streak is sure to follow.

With contributions from every single player in the bottom half of the batting order, Evanston extended its winning string to 9 in a row --- and 14 out of the last 15 --- and clinched a second place finish in the Central Suburban League South division with an 8-5 victory over Deerfield Wednesday.

Braden Grimm struck out 10 in his 5-inning mound stint and also slugged a two-run home run as part of an Evanston eruption for 7 runs in the 4th inning as the Wildkits improved to 22-6-1. They finished 12-4 in league play, four games behind champion New Trier.

ETHS pounded out 10 hits in the win to keep their momentum going for the final stretch run of the regular season. The Kits will be challenged by a busy slate of games against Notre Dame (Thursday), St. Patrick (Friday), Lane Tech (Saturday) and Warren (Monday) before the start of postseason play.

Evanston earned the No. 4 seed in the Class 4A Lane Tech Sectional tournament complex and will host a regional tournament beginning on Wednesday, May 22nd. They’ll host No. 13 seed Leyden at 4:30 p.m., with the winner advancing to play either No. 5 Loyola Academy or No. 12 Taft in the title game on May 25th.

Head coach Frank Consiglio is hoping the May success leads to a few games in June, too. That’s when the Illinois High School Association state finals take place.

“We love our pitching staff, and we love our defense,” Consiglio said. “We’re not beating ourselves during this streak we’ve put together. We’re giving up a run here or there, but we’re making teams come out and try to score on us --- and they’re not doing it.

“We’re fielding at a really high percentage right now. We decided before the season to focus on our defense --- we didn’t pick up a bat for a long time --- because we wanted to be the best defensive team in the Central Suburban League. We haven’t been that good defensively the last couple of years.”

The decision to move junior Avan Teuer into the No. 6 slot in the ETHS batting order has also paid dividends. Teuer, an outfielder, has a chance to develop into a middle of the order hitter when the roster turns over for 2025, but meanwhile his bat farther down has helped make it more difficult for opposing hurlers get a breather facing the bottom of the lineup.

Wednesday, Teuer reached base in all four plate appearances with a single, a ground rule double and two walks. He drove in a pair of runs and the hitters below him in the order --- Jake Kobus, Jonah Hofeld and Vinny Miller --- combined to reach base safely four times.

Consiglio doesn’t expect those players to carry the offense once the postseason starts. But he’s happy to take any contributions with solid at-bats every time up.

“In the playoffs, if you have holes in the bottom of your order, the other teams will pitch right to that,” Consiglio pointed out. “We’ve got some length to our lineup now, but we still need them to improve a little more.

“Teuer is a real energy player. Put him in the lineup and he goes 100 miles per hour. He battles and he does damage with a two-strike account, and he’s an elite outfielder. It’s great having him in that No. 6 spot.”

Winning pitcher Grimm, who will be part of a formidable 1-2 punch with Eron Vega when it comes down to the one-and-done portion of the 2024 campaign, racked up 10 strikeouts while walking two.

He issued a bases-loaded walk to Deerfield’s Matt Willner to produce a run in the 2nd, and the Warriors capitalized on a walk, two wild pitches and an infield out to do their “damage” against the hard-throwing righty in the 5th.

On offense, the hosts were held to just one hit over the first three innings by Deerfield hurler Ike Schlesinger. But Evanston sent 11 hitters to the plate in that 7-run 4th as Teuer and Kobus collected RBI singles, Miller lashed a two-run double down the right field line, and Grimm launched a drive over the 340-foot sign in right center field with Vega on first to cap the scoring.

Evanston’s other run came in the 5th when Owen Vander Velde doubled down the third base line and came around on Teuer’s ground-rule double to right center.