Walk-Off Blast Caps 17-15 Eureka Win Over Westminster
EUREKA – For the second time this season, Eureka's Sam Buduris (Shorewood, Ill.Minooka Community/McKendree) delivered a walk-off home run to lock up a St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference win in extra innings on Saturday.
The junior's two-run blast over the right-field fence ended a 10-inning slugfest and clinched a 17-15 victory over Westminster on a chilly day at Henry Sand Field.
It was Eureka's fifth walk-off win and third extra-inning win of the spring. More importantly, it lifted the Red Devils back over .500 in both league play and on the season overall.
Eureka is now 15-14 and 7-6 in SLIAC play – good for fifth in the conference.
The second game of the day got suspended due to darkness in the eighth inning with Westminster clinging to a 5-4 lead. That game will be concluded on Sunday at 1 p.m. prior to the Red Devils' Senior Day celebration and the series finale.
Game 1: Eureka 17, Westminster 15
Long before the thrilling finish, the Red Devils had to climb their way out of a seven-run hole.
The Blue Jays scored the first seven runs of the game in the first two innings. The home team got more than half of it back with a four-run second inning that included three hits and a Westminster error.
Buduris led the inning off with a double and Joshua Frenden (New Port Richey, Fla./River Ridge/Philander Smith) drove him in with an RBI single on the next at-bat. He would later score on a fielder's choice RBI, another run came from a throwing error, and Mike Dunne (Bartonville, Ill./Limestone/Lincoln Land) singled to center to put four on the board for EC.
The Blue Jays and Red Devils traded runs in the third, with Chase Ulrich's (East Peoria, Ill./East Peoria/Illinois Central College) RBI single scoring Buduris and making it 8-5.
EC then rallied for four more runs to take a 9-8 lead in the fourth. Jackson Green (Terrell, Texas/Terrell/Bacone) produced an RBI double. A run scored on a balk and two more came home after a fielding error.
The Blue Jays wrested the lead back with a pair of runs in the fifth and extended it to four with two more in the sixth, but the Red Devils would go away.
They chipped away at the lead with a run on an RBI single in the seventh and another on bases-loaded walk in the eighth.
With the lead down to one run, the Blue Jays extended it back to three again with three hits in the ninth, including back-to-back RBI doubles.
The pressure was on EC in the bottom of the ninth, and just as the team has done so many times before this season, it kept fighting and rose to the occasion. Nickolas Cartmill (Burleson, Texxas/Burleson/Bacone) drove in a pair, and with the bases loaded, Gabe Peters (Washington, Ill./Washington/Mount Mercy) reached on an error that allowed the game-tying run to score.
The Blue Jays managed to avoid going down in walk-off fashion in the ninth, but in the 10th, Green singled to center with one out, sending Buduris to the plate to belt his seventh long ball of the year and end a three-hour, 50-minute marathon.
Buduris –who leads the SLIAC with a .422 batting average – went 4-for-6 on the day with a double and a pair of singles to complement the walk-off bomb. Green notched three hits, including a double, while Dunne and Ulrich each contributed a pair of hits.
Eureka finished with 17 runs on 16 hits. Westminster tallied 20 hits in a losing effort.
Although the EC pitching staff took its lumps throughout the day, Nick Rulevish (Addieville, Ill./Okawville) improved to 5-0 on the season after persevering through 5 2/3 innings in relief while allowing five runs on nine hits. He didn't walk a single batter and notched three strikeouts.