A passed ball and a strong pitching performance keyed Shawano’s 3-2 defeat of Ahnapee in an American Legion Class AA regional tournament game Thursday at Luxemburg-Casco High School.
Shawano advanced with some timely hitting and patience in the bottom of the seventh inning Thursday. After Zack Sousek hit a double, Ahnapee issued back-to-back intentional walks to Grant Wainio and Chase Henning to load the bases for Jack Lacy.
On a 2-0 count, pitcher Tory Jandrin threw a ball passed the catcher, scoring Sousek with the winning run.
“Jack was pretty smart out there,” said Sousek, who was 2 for 4. “He did not swing at any bad pitches.”
Wainio was the winning pitcher. He worked seven innings, allowed one earned run, struck out four and issued no walks.
“We had really good pitching. Grant really threw a really nice game,” Shawano coach Will Gillis said. “We played good defense and we only had one error.”
“Grant was really dealing today,” Sousek said. “He started at bats with fastballs and then curveballs to get stuff going.”
Sousek singled and scored the first run of the game on a Chase Henning single in the bottom of the first inning.
Ahnapee responded with runs in the second and fourth inning to pull ahead 2-1.
Shawano (15-10, 8-4 FRV-West) scored the game-tying run in the sixth on a sacrifice fly by Kasey Kristof to score Lacy, who went 2 for 3.
Jandrin picked up the loss for Ahnapee. He threw six innings, allowed eight hits, struck out four and walked three.
“We didn’t hit the ball anywhere near where we are capable of doing,” Ahnapee coach Sam Andre said. “We only had six base runners all day, and one of our runs scored was on a wild pitch or passed ball.”
The Patriots’ next tourney foe will be Pulaski, at 8 p.m. Friday at Luxemburg-Casco. Pulaski defeated Seymour, 7-6, Thursday.
Austin Smith is the leading hitter for Pulaski (4-7 Fox River Valley-Central) with a .308 average, eight runs scored and a double in eight league games.
