Saturday sweep needed: Top-seeded Hawks face elimination after losing super regional opener

QUINCY — The weather hasn’t always been ideal, but Saturdays at QU Stadium throughout the spring have been perfect nonetheless.

One more flawless Saturday is needed.

The Quincy University baseball team finds itself in a win-twice-or-it’s-over scenario following Friday’s 4-3 loss to Indianapolis in the opening game of the NCAA Division II Midwest Super Regional, but the top-seeded Hawks have the comfort of QU Stadium to rely on.

The Hawks are 29-3 overall at home and 11-0 at home on Saturdays, which is a good omen for their final Saturday in Quincy regardless of the outcome.

“It’s not over at all,” QU right-hander Spencer Walker said. “We’re grinders, and we’re emptying the tank tomorrow.”

That seemed to be the common refrain following the end of their 17-game win streak.

“At the end of the day, play it like it’s another weekend,” senior second baseman Nolan Wosman said.

The first game is scheduled for noon Saturday. Should Quincy (47-10) win, a rubber match would be played at 3:30 p.m. If seventh-seeded Indianapolis (38-19) win the first game, the Greyhounds head to the Division II World Series and the Hawks head into summer.

“No matter what, win or lose, Saturday is our last day out here together,” QU coach Matt Schissel said. “Come out and empty the clip and see what happens.”

Junior left-hander Griffin Kirn will get the start Saturday with a Game 3 starter to be determined.

“We have to win the first one,” Schissel said.

The Greyhounds likely will throw either junior left-hander Seth Spencer or senior left-hander Brady Ware, although right-hander Logan Peterson remains an option as well.

After seeing the way left-hander Brandon DeWitt handcuffed the Hawks on Friday, another lefty is likely to get the call.

DeWitt threw 143 pitches in a complete-game effort, allowing three earned runs on eight hits with 10 strikeouts and two walks. He induced nine groundouts and allowed back-to-back runners to get on base twice.

The Hawks left six runners on base, but had runners on first and second base with no outs in the second inning and failed to score. They also stranded runners in scoring position in the sixth and seventh innings.

“(DeWitt) does a really good job of keeping guys off-balance,” Schissel said. “Our guys don’t see a lot of left-on-left changeups. Our guys don’t see six or seven straight breaking balls. That’s what he did all day. He’d throw two or three out of the zone and then he’s coming right back at you.”

He does it without high velocity, which the Hawks’ power hitters want to see.

“It’s the same thing that always gets us,” said Wosman, who went 1 for 4 with two RBIs. “It’s just a slow left-handed pitcher who throws a lot of junk. Personally, I don’t think anything else really made him special. I don’t think his stuff was really that different than what you typically see. The speed difference is really what throws us off.”

DeWitt has done that before.

During the 2022 regular season, he limited the Hawks to one hit over four scoreless innings with four strikeouts and no walks as the Greyhounds won 3-0. In the GLVC Tournament in 2022, DeWitt worked seven innings with two earned runs and seven hits allowed to go with nine strikeouts and one walk.

The Hawks won that game 4-3, but the lack of explosive offense against DeWitt was the same.

“He’s given every team he’s pitched against a good run for their money,” Walker said. “Today, we experienced it a little bit.”

Walker did the same thing to the Greyhounds.

He lasted 7 ⅔ innings, allowing four runs on five hits with nine strikeouts and one walk. He allowed just two hits over the first seven innings — one was a second-inning two-run home run by Nick Lukac — and gave up three singles in the eighth, the last of which didn’t leave the infield but led to the go-ahead runs scoring.

“Two pitches was the difference,” Schissel said. “Two pitches that were hits.”

The Hawks needed one of those moments to put a charge in the offense.

Gino D’Alessio led off the bottom of the first inning with a single, went to second on a groundout, took third on a wild pitch and scored on a Luke Napleton sacrifice fly. In the sixth, Napleton doubled with one out and scored on Wosman’s two-out single.

In the eighth, Napleton led off with a double, took third on a groundout and scored on Wosman’s groundout. None of the Hawks reached base after that.

The Hawks never had a moment where one hit followed another until a big blow happened.

“This season, we’ve had those moments and you never really worry about that happening because you know it’s coming,” Wosman said. “Today, we hit some balls hard and just couldn’t get anything to drop. They had a couple plays where they were in that one right spot and things kind of fell apart a little bit for us.”

It’s forced the Hawks into a need for a sweep, something they’ve done in 10 of 14 doubleheaders played this season.

“We’ve done this all year, we’ve done this every week since we’ve gotten back from Florida,” Schissel said. “It’s nothing out of the ordinary. Guys show up and win Game 1 and then we’ll see what happens.”