The Hancock-Henderson Quill, Inc.
The La Harpe junior high boys baseball team participated in the Class A State Tournament this past weekend at the East Side Center in East Peoria.
In the state quarter-finals on Friday, September 30, the Eagles battled defending state champions, Joliet (St. Raymond).
La Harpe spotted Joliet a 1-0 in the top of the first inning, but quickly tied it at 1-1 in the bottom half of the first.
Lead-off man Chris Corzatt was hit by a pitch to start the inning.
He moved to second on a fielder's choice and scored later on a 2-out single by Dylan Van Fleet.
Starting pitcher Michael Lafferty then threw 4 consecutive scoreless innings, giving his offense time to get cranked up.
The break-through inning for the Eagles proved to be the 3rd inning. The Eagles tallied 5 runs to take a 6-1 grip on the game.
base and when the catcher threw to 2nd,
Trout stole home on the back-end of a perfect double steal. Mitchell Beals then walked, setting up the offensive hero of the game, Justin Graves.
After falling behind early in the count, Graves fought off two tough two strike pitches before hitting a towering 3-run home run to centerfield that hit the top of the fence and bounced over to make the score 6-1.
St. Raymond tallied 2 runs in the top of the sixth to pull to within 6-3. In the bottom of the sixth, Beals reached on an error, stole second, and moved to third on a wild pitch.
After two straight strikeouts, Travis Hobby walked. Tyler Kiley ran for Hobby and broke for second on the first pitch.
Beals stole home on the throw to second for the second perfectly executed double steal of the day for the Eagles. St. Raymond scored one run in the top of the 7th inning, but Lafferty was able to get a pop-up, a ground out and a strikeout, to fittingly end a great pitching performance, with the Eagles taking a 7-4 decision.
After realizing a team-goal of making the state tournament and defeating the defending state champs to reach the "trophy games," the Eagles returned on Saturday, October 1, to look to attain their ultimate goal, a state championship.
Starting one hour later than scheduled due to an extra-inning game preceding their own, the Eagles let no obstacle stand in their way in the state semi-final game.