THE JOURNAL & TOPICS NEWSPAPERS | FRIDAY, MAY 2, 2008

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Streaky Lions Back To Winning Ways

Talk about a streaky high school baseball team.

St. Viator's Lions roared out of the gate this spring at 7-1, fell to 8-6, and now sit at 14-8, owners of a six-game winning streak. That translates to streaks of 7-1, 1-5, and 6-2.

The Lions won their 5th and 6th games in a row with a doubleheader win over Marist this week in Chicago. The scores were 6-5 and 14-5.

They won game one with sharp and timely pitching, and the second with a ton of hitting. Game one went 8 innings. In the Lion eighth, Jack Meyer led off with his second double, was bunted to third by Eric Huber, and rode home on Sean Folan's sacrifice fly.

Bryce Hensley got the pitching win with 2 1/3 innings of relief. Brendan King, a sophomore called up to bolster a sometimes shaky Lion pitching staff, gave up 13 hits but only 3 runs with 4 strikeouts and only 1 walk in five-plus innings.

In game two, St. Viator banged out 14 hits and took a 9-1 lead after 4 innings. Phil Bar had 4 hits ands 2 RBIs, Meyer went 3-for-4 and drove home 4, Huber was 2-for-4 with 2 RBI, Brett Key had 2 hits and Brian Byrne slammed a 2-run single. Mike Bordes was the winning pitcher in the nightcap with 3 strikeouts and 1 walk.

Elsewhere in the Journal area this week -

* Highland Park scored 3 runs in the seventh inning to upend Maine West, 4-1.

* Leyden improved to 15-2 with a 9-3 win over Proviso East.

* Carmel pushed across a run in the bottom of the seventh inning to take a 4-3 win from Notre Dame. Losing pitcher for the Dons was Mike Trotta.