‘You can’t stop it’: Walk-off grand slam keeps Hawks rolling with twinbill sweep of Panthers

QUINCY — A rally that began with a record-breaking home run, ended with an epic bat flip and featured some of the most selfless, mature at-bats in between left everyone exiting QU Stadium with the same train of thought.

This Quincy University baseball squad may truly be a team of destiny.

“I told you three days ago if we go on a nine-game heater you better watch out for this team,” Hawks center fielder Brock Boynton said. “We’re still on track for it. If we keep this ball rolling, you can’t stop it.”

Not even a six-run swing of momentum could cause the Hawks to pump the brakes.

Saturday afternoon at QU Stadium, Drury erased a 7-2 deficit by scoring six times in the sixth inning and headed to the seventh inning with an 8-7 lead and three outs from upending NCAA Division II’s eighth-ranked team.

Then Luke Napleton led off the bottom of the seventh with a home to left field — his 24th of the season to break the QU single-season record — and the Hawks loaded the bases with two outs as Austin Simpson, Zach Parks and JD Ortiz each drew a walk.

Boyton ended it three pitches later, launching a no-doubt grand slam to right field for a 12-8 victory and flipping his bat high in the air and toward the QU dugout.

“Righty slider and let the hands work,” Boynton said with a smile.

The Hawks seized the momentum to bury the Panthers 17-0 in the second game of Saturday’s Great Lakes Valley Conference doubleheader. Quincy (35-9, 22-5 GLVC) will go for the sweep at noon Sunday with fifth-year right-hander Jay Hammel on the bump.

“We definitely built on the momentum of that first game. It was an electric game,” QU shortstop Gino D’Alessio said. “We knew what we were going to do in the second game.”

The series of at-bats that set up Boynton’s grand slam were an injection of confidence.

“Those are experienced at-bats,” D’Alessio said. “Those guys were comfortable in those at-bats. They knew what they had to do to keep the inning going, and they did it.”

Simpson saw five pitches, Parks worked the count full before walking, and Ortiz came on as a pinch-hitter and worked the count full before getting on base.

“I was able to see a bunch of pitches in the on-deck circle,” Boynton said. “Our veteran hitters we have throughout our whole lineup will see pitches and show patience and learn from the pitches that they’ve seen before.”

The Hawks are confident they will come through in any situation as well.

Senior right-hander Cruz Meier allowed the tying and go-ahead runs in the sixth, but worked a 1-2-3 seventh inning. He would have trotted back out for the eighth had the game continued.

“Before we went to bat in the seventh, we told Cruz he wasn’t going back out there because we had that much confidence we were going to finish it,” Boynton said. “We all have each other’s back. That’s the difference between this team and any other club in the country.”

In the nightcap, the Hawks buried the Panthers with a show of power.

Nolan Wosman hit a two-run homer as part of a four-run first inning. D’Alessio jacked a two-run home run in the second and there were four doubles and a D’Alessio three-run home run in the 10-run fourth inning.

“There was just a grit to today,” said D’Alessio, who went 4 for 6 with five runs scored and five RBIs in the doubleheader. “In the first game, we were cruising and we thought we were going to cruise through the seventh. Then they punched us in the face a little bit.

“We came back and we knew we weren’t losing.”

The Hawks simply don’t lose at home, improving to 25-2 this season at QU Stadium.

“When you come into our barn, you better expect it’s not going to be a friendly place,” Boynton said.