BASEBALL: Free passes cost Pinckneyville-Du Quoin Jr. Legion
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Pinckneyville-Du Quoin faces a do-or-die situation after getting crushed 18-2 by Belleville on Sunday at the Junior American Legion 5th Division Tournament in Vandalia, and will meet Bethalto at 12:30 p.m. on Monday for the right to advance to the State Tournament.
The Hilgards scored their eighteen runs on just nine hits as Posts 2504 & 647 issued thirteen walks and hit three batters
"You can't have double digit walks and hit three guys, that's sixteen free base runners you've given them," said Pinckneyville-Du Quoin coach Alan Engelhardt. "That can't happen, you can't do that and succeed."
Before all the trouble started, 2504/647 got on the board in the bottom of the first when A.J. Smith singled with one out in front of a double by Joey Burris. Dalton Bigham grounded to second moments later to bring Smith in from third for a 1-0 lead.
Burris, Pinckneyville-Du Quoin's starter, ran into a jam right afterwards in the top of the second when Belleville's Alec Pellegrino led off with a triple. The next three batters all drew walks, forcing Pellegrino in to tie the game.
Burris nearly escaped without further damage, striking out the next two hitters, but then walked Post 58 leadoff hitter Brayden James to bring in another run. Zach Skaer followed with a two-out RBI single and Belleville was up 3-1.
Braden Kitowski took over on the mound in the third, but hit two batters, walked another and gave up four hits in his first inning of work.
"From an ability standpoint, you'd like to have Joey (Burris) on the mound, but when he walked four guys in one inning we thought maybe it's better to have him in relief tomorrow as a potential guy to come in," Engelhardt said.
Adam Banach pushed Nolan Luke across for a run in the bottom of the fourth for P-DQ, but Belleville got two in the fifth and eight in the sixth to put the game out of reach.
Post 58 starter Parker Beine tossed all six innings and allowed four hits and two walks.
"He was good," Engelhardt said of the right-hander Beine. "It was one of those games that if you're going to win to win it's got to be 4-3, 3-2, something like that. We scored a couple runs, and then Joey hits one that their kid makes a heck of a catch on it, maybe that would have been another couple runs."
"I can't complain about the way we swung the bats, but we build ourselves on pitching and defense and that didn't hold up tonight."
Smith (2-3, R), Burris (1-3, 2B) and Brian Taylor (1-3) hit safely for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin in defeat.
2504/647 must beat Bethalto on Monday to keep their season alive as one of three advancing teams from the 5th Division.
<u>P'ville-Du Quoin beats Altamont in Rd. 1</u>
Smith put together his second dominating start of the postseason for P'ville-Du Quoin on Saturday, going the distance and giving up just three hits while walking six and hitting two men in 2504/647's 4-2 win over Altamont. Smith struck out nine batters in his seven innings of work.
Taylor and Smith walked in the bottom of the first before Bigham doubled with one out for an RBI. Smith came in on a passed ball, then Brendon Shepard singled in Bigham for a quick 3-0 lead for Pinckneyville-Du Quoin.
Nolan Luke tripled and scored on Shepard's second RBI of the game in the sixth.
Shepard (2-3, 2 RBI), Bigham (3-3, 2B, R, RBI), Smith (1-1, 2 BB, R) and Luke (1-2, 3B, BB, R) had the hits against Altamont.
<element id="paragraph-1" type="body"></element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[ <element id="paragraph-1" type="body"></element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[</group>