GRAND CHUTE − OK folks, let’s play a game. Let’s see what adjective best describes this Hortonville baseball team.
Gritty? That’s a good start. Stoic? Getting warmer, but we can do better.
Hmm, how about resilient? Oh boy, there it is − ding, ding ding!
The Polar Bears showed plenty of resilience Wednesday, shrugging off an early deficit and early hitting woes to upend Franklin, 4-1, in a WIAA Division 1 state semifinal at Fox Cities Stadium.
The win catapults Hortonville (26-4) to Thursday’s championship game against Whitefish Bay (24-7), with the Polar Bears in position to clinch their first state title since 1998.
“That’s what it’s all about,” Hortonville coach Greg Yaeger said about the mental fortitude of the team. “When we’ve been close we haven’t been able to get over the hump and it’s been those situations where we haven’t been able to get the big hit. We’ve been preaching all year and just staying focused: ‘Don’t get too high, don’t get too low. We got all 21 outs and we’re going to use them all.’ And our kids believe. They aren’t going to give up and they’re dialed in for seven innings.”
Hortonville wouldn’t be in position to win its first state title in 25 seasons without plenty of mental toughness. Starting pitcher Nate Vela and the rest of the Polar Bears displayed plenty of that after falling behind 1-0 after Franklin centerfielder Alex Mierow crushed a solo home run to left field in the second inning.
Vela recovered nicely and didn’t allow another hit until the seventh inning. He finished with 10 strikeouts and two hits allowed in a virtuoso performance.
“Oh, it was a bomb,” Yeager said of Mierow’s home run. “But Nate’s (bounced back) like that all year. If you ever watch him on the mound − if he ever throws two balls in a row − he’ll take a step back, take a deep breath and get back in his zone and that’s what you saw out there tonight.”
The Polar Bears offense misfired early, having runners in scoring position in the first four innings, including a bases-loaded situation in the fourth with one out. Franklin starter Joe Herrick got a 4-6-3 double play to escape unscathed, but the Polar Bears were unfazed.
They finally broke through in the fifth, on another big hit by Brett Sommer.
Sommer, who had a key RBI triple in Monday’s quarterfinal win over Middleton, pounced on a Herrick offering to start the fifth Wednesday. He roped a triple off the left field wall and Camden Kuhnke followed with an infield single to score Sommer and even the game at 1-1.
Singles from Joe Fischer and Turner Kuhnke loaded the bases, setting up a two-run single up the middle from Thomas Burns.
“It was a fastball and I was not thinking to do too much,” Burns said. “Just wanted to send it back up the middle and that’s what I did. Just trying to get some runs across and put us ahead.”
An RBI single from Nathan Grams − the fifth hit of the inning for Hortonville − gave the Polar Bears a commanding 4-1 lead heading to the sixth.
That was enough for Vela, who retired the Sabers in order in the sixth and then weathered a walk and single in the seventh by collecting three strikeouts to ice the win.
Vela pointed to the four-run outburst in the fifth as the lift he needed.
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“It gave me that extra boost of confidence, you know?” Vela said. “My pitches were feeling even better after that. I couldn’t be more thankful for my teammates and them having my back on that.”
Camden Kuhnke said it was only a matter of time before the Polar Bears got to Herrick.
“It felt so good, man,” he said. “We got left on the edge so many times, but we knew it was coming though. We kept hitting the pitcher. We were on him the whole time, just hitting it right at people. Felt so good once we finally got one and it led to the whole rally. We were all set to go.”
Sommer agreed.
“I was saying to my teammates, ‘We’re seeing them just fine,’ ” he said. “We were hitting the ball and just missing. I go up to the plate and I was confident and I saw a pitch down the middle and started the rolling bats. Cam got a hit right after me, Joey got a hit and everybody started to hit.”
Whitefish Bay whipped top-seeded Stevens Point, 17-0, in the other semifinal. The Blue Dukes collected 20 hits and scored 10 runs in the first three innings against the Panthers.
Yaeger said Hortonville is going with senior right-hander Kolden Hunter against Whitefish Bay and the team also has Bo Anderson, Ethan Peters and main reliever Camden Kuhnke if the need arises.
“It’s baseball, so we hope (Whitefish Bay) used up all their hits (Wednesday),” Yaeger said with a smile. “So we’re going to move the ball around and keep them off balance. It looks like they were hitting a lot of belt-high fastballs. We gotta hit the knees, up and down. (Hunter) is a guy who does that and that’s a strength. We’re going to go out there and compete with him and hopefully we can have this conversation again tomorrow night.”
Kuhnke said the players will approach the biggest game of their lives like they have every game this season.
“It’s just another game, that’s how we got to look at it,” he said. “We’re playing our game right now and we’re winning. We just gotta go out there (Thursday), throw strikes, make the routine plays and we’ll be just fine.”
Franklin 010 000 0 − 1 2 1
Hortonville 000 040 x − 4 8 0
WP: Nate Vela (7IP, 2H, 10K). LP: Joe Herrick (5IP, 4ER, 3K). Leading hitters: Alex Mierow F HR, RBI; Brett Sommer H 2×2, 3B, SB; Thomas Burns H 2×3, 2 RBI.