Illinois Valley Junior League baseball team places second at state

Before the season started, Mark Grzybowski knew the Illinois Valley Baseball League had the potential to have a strong Junior League All-Star team.

“We knew we had a talented group because last year the Oglesby boys went on a run and I think ended up in the final four,” Grzybowski said. “We knew we had the bulk of that core coming back to us this year — and then with the formation of the Illinois Valley League, you add the Peru, La Salle and Utica kids. We knew we would have a strong team and a deep pool to chose players from.

“We talked about it at the beginning of the season with it being the first year of the Illinois Valley League how historic it was going to be to be part of it. Then to have a team that had the potential to go deep and to strive for something made the season much more fun.”

The potential turned into success as the Illinois Valley Junior League All-Stars placed second in the state tournament, losing 11-1 to River Forest/Elmhurst in the title game Tuesday in Burbank.

“It’s pretty special,” Grzybowski said. “The last comment I shared with them (after the title game) was to take one more look at your jersey and hat that say Illinois Valley on them. I said you represented a region and you represented it very well.

“I got text messages from folks back home saying you guys got this, keep up the good work. I told them they made a lot of people back home very proud of what you were able to do.”

Grzybowski said the players did a good job coming together as one team despite being from four different towns.

“When we started practicing, we felt it was important as a coaching staff to say, ‘We’re united, we’re in this together,’ ”Grzybowski said. “They bought into that early. I’m proud of the boys for coming together. It isn’t easy when you have this many towns and allegiances to each town. But they became a team quickly, and I think that was a huge contributor to this team going far.”

Illinois Valley started strong by outscoring opponents 51-1 in the District 20 Tournament, including wins of 2-0 and 4-1 over Spring Valley.

“We definitely had some deep pitching,” Grzybowski said. “We had a roster of 14 and had a legitimate 10 or 11 pitchers we could have thrown out there any game. That’s a luxury to have.”

At state, Illinois Valley put up some big offensive numbers, winning 21-1 and 14-1 on the first day of the tournament. Illinois Valley won 7-0 in its last pool game before rolling to a 28-3 victory in the semifinals.

“We talked to the boys about attacking the baseball and not letting the pitcher dictate at-bats,” Grzybowski said. “All 14 of them bought into that. I like to be aggressive with the bats. What also helped was for most of the games of the tournament, we were the home team. So we were able to establish our pitcher, hopefully put up a zero and then come out and start hitting right away. We wanted to jump on teams early, put up runs and have that mindset that we’re in control.”

In the title game, Illinois Valley fell behind 4-0 but cut it to 4-1 on a sacrifice fly by Brady Blomquist in the fourth. River Forest/Elmhurst put the game away with six runs in the sixth with three scoring on a pair of errors and three on a bases-clearing double.

For IV, Anthony Turri was 2 for 2 with a double, while Nolan Siebert, Keegan Campbell, Payton Davis and Kahne Gentert each had a hit.