Quincy, Ill. - It was the end of the regular season road for ICC baseball (21-32, 15-17) on Friday afternoon, as the Cougars made the return trip to Quincy to take on the John Wood Blazers, with John Wood having taken the first two games of the series on Thursday in East Peoria. ICC hit right with the Blazers in games one and two, dropping both games by a one-run margin. This time, John Wood would slug their way to a 22-run day, taking both games on Friday and completing the 4-0 sweep against ICC.
GAME 1 - JOHN WOOD 11, ICC COUGARS 1
The Blazers went right to work, scoring all 11 of their runs for the game within the first three innings.
ICC would finally break through in the fourth.
Beau Durbin led off the inning with a double, then
Camden Porter would hit him in with an RBI single to set the final score.
The Cougars were putting bat on ball, with the Blazers only tallying four strikeouts on the bump over the 15 outs.
GAME 2 - JOHN WOOD 11, ICC COUGARS 3
At least initially, it seemed as if the Blazers had run out of gas. After all, they were on 23 runs through the first three games of the series. Aidan Leemans was holding things down pitching-wise, with the defense on par as well. From 11 runs in the first three innings of game one, the Cougars held the Blazers scoreless in that same span for the finale.
Camden Porter's base running helped the Cougars towards their first run of the game. After leading off the third with a single, he'd take both second base (passed ball) and third base (wild pitch) while
Nate Stear was at the plate. Stear, behind in the count at 2-1, would hit a sacrifice fly deep enough into center field to bring in Porter and give the Cougars a 1-0 lead through three.
Beau Durbin (single) and
Josh Heyder (walk) would also reach base in the inning, but they were stranded.
The Blazers would take a 3-1 lead into the fifth before ICC answered back. Porter and Stear would go back-to-back on singles to put runners in scoring position for
Zach Otten, would would single and score Porter. That kept two in scoring position, but any further attempt was snuffed and the Blazer lead stayed at 3-2.
From there, John Wood used the power game to take control, going ahead as much as 8-2.
ICC wasn't done just yet, with Porter continuing his quality afternoon with a leadoff solo home run in the seventh.
The Blazers would tack on three more runs in the bottom half to set the final score.
WHAT'S NEXT FOR THE COUGARS
As of publication, it appears as if the Cougars will go into the Region 24 Tournament as the sixth seed. When that seed line and more details such as first pitch times are officially available, those will all be relayed. The tournament starts next Wednesday, May 17th, and runs through Championship Sunday, May 21st, with all games taking place at Normal's Corn Crib, the home field for the Heartland Hawks.
