By MIKE ROSE
Jaden Sherwood starred Monday in a dominant two-way effort to lead Notre Dame Batavia into the Class B semifinals. Sherwood delivered the game-winning blow with two outs in the bottom of the seventh, lining the first pitch he saw into right field for a walk-off RBI single to knock off the Le Roy Oatkan Knights, 3-2.
“I’m never nervous of any situation to be honest,” Sherwood said. “My guys delivered, they got on base and in scoring position, they put it in my hands and I got it done.”
Sherwood’s heroics came after Evan Fitzpatrick led off the inning with a walk followed by back-to-back near double plays on a sacrifice bunt attempt and ground ball from Adyn Horzempa and Joe DiRisio. Jay Antinore nearly ended it, lining a double into right field before Sherwood sealed the Irish’s 16th consecutive victory with a base hit that scored DiRisio.
“Jaden’s been terrific all year long,” Notre Dame head coach Rick Rapone said. “He was our league’s player of the year, I felt he should’ve been the (Class) B player of the year. He’s not just a pitcher, you saw a great hitter and a great clutch hitter. He’s just a unique player, very, very unique. Offense, defense, running the bases.”
Sherwood also got the start on the mound for the Irish and struck out 12 in a complete game effort. He allowed five hits and walked one allowing two unearned runs in the win. The two runs allowed marked the 16th game this season that Notre Dame’s pitching has held its opponents to two runs or fewer despite a pair of errors that helped Le Roy score both its runs.
“We have tremendous pitching and our pitching showed up again today,” Rapone said. “What hurt us today was our defense. We didn’t play very good defense and that hasn’t been the case all year long.”
It was a sloppy game at times from both sides which created some missed opportunities early on. In the first, Antinore led off with a single but was cut down on a caught stealing. In the second, Le Roy had its first two hitters of the inning reach bringing Jake Higgins to the plate. Higgins squared to bunt and popped it up back to Sherwood on the mound who secured it and eventually turned an inning-ending triple play with both runners having left on contact.
Le Roy’s defensive issues arose in the bottom half of the inning to get Notre Dame on the board first. A trio of errors from the Oatkan Knights allowed Chase Cummings to reach and eventually score to make it a 1-0 lead after two. The Irish struck again in the third after a leadoff single from Antinore was followed by a booming RBI triple from Sherwood into left field. However, a potential big inning stalled out on Chase Antinore’s safety squeeze attempt gone wrong. Antinore was thrown out at first and Sherwood was thrown out at the plate for a rally-killing double play. An inning later the Irish had another runner cut down at the plate to end another threat. Despite the missed chances, Notre Dame took a 2-0 lead into the fourth.
In the fourth, an error from Notre Dame allowed Alex Spezzano to reach to begin the inning before Adam Woodworth worked a walk. After Sherwood struck out Jackson Spezzano, Peter Clark hit a chopper to second base and legged out an infield single. The throw from Cummings at second base went into right field and allowed the first Le Roy run to score. Sherwood would work another strikeout before Jake Higgins picked up an RBI single on a sharply hit ball to third base scoring Woodworth to tie the game.
Things paused in the bottom of the fifth when a fan had to receive medical attention after fainting due to the heat at Dwyer Stadium. The delay lasted over twenty minutes before the fan, who had regained consciousness, was helped from the stadium by paramedics called to the scene. Out of the delay with the game tied at two, both teams tried to settle back in.
“The most important thing is the pitcher,” Rapone said. “Making sure the pitcher is ready and the pitcher’s good to go and warmed up and he’s all set. Thank god with Le Roy you have a very good coach and a very responsible coach and he made sure that both teams were going to get enough time to warm up and truthfully I think our pitcher came out of it a tad better than their pitcher came out of it.”
Le Roy got its best chance to pull ahead in the sixth when Jackson Spezzano roped a one-out double into center field. Sherwood would settle things, striking out two of the next three hitters to retire the threat once again. Sherwood would rack up strikeouts 11 and 12 in the seventh before winning it in the bottom half of the frame.
Despite being on the wrong end of the result Alex Spezzano put together a strong outing for Le Roy on the mound. He went the distance allowing one earned run (three runs) on five hits and three walks with five punchouts. Offensively Le Roy got a pair of hits from Drew Strollo and one each from Clark, Higgins and Jackson Spezzano. For Notre Dame, Sherwood finished 2-for-4 with a pair of RBI while Jay Antinore recorded two hits and scored a run.
The defending Class C2 champions Notre Dame are seeking to make the sectional finals for the fourth straight season in a third different classification. The Irish fell in the Class D1 finals in 2021 to Keshequa and dropped the Class C2 finals in 2022 to Oakfield-Alabam before defeating Bolivar-Richburg in last season’s C2 title game. Rapone knows his team will need to get back to what got them here to stay alive moving forward.
“Go back to what we did the previous 15 games,” Rapone said. “Go back to pitching, playing great defense, running the bases and getting timely hits. You don’t need a lot of hits but you need to get timely hits.”
The Irish will take on No. 6 seeded North Rose-Wolcott in the semifinals on Wednesday night after the Cougars defeated No. 3 seed Penn Yan in the quarterfinals. Notre Dame will host the semifinal bout at Dwyer Stadium with a start time to be determined.
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