A start against Prairie Ridge in a snow and sleet storm last year properly prepared Huntley’s Eric Luecht for a season-opening start Wednesday with temperatures in the 20s.
The senior right-hander struck out eight over 5 1/3 innings and teammate Brandon Altergott shook off sitting in the cold for a few innings before stepping into the lineup to produce two key run-scoring hits in the Red Raiders’ 6-1 victory over Conant at Elmhurst’s Plunkett Field.
“I have a little trouble in the cold,” Luecht said. “I tried not to let it get to me too much. My changeup was a little bit off so I just went to my slider and it started working for me.
“But I felt like mentally I was prepared after PR (Prairie Ridge) last year where we went through a big blizzard and played through the game. I figured I if I could do that, I was ready for today.”
Luecht gave up a first-inning, two-out RBI single to Mike Matej, but that was it. He avoided a walk until the fifth and held Conant to five hits in his 75-pitch stint for the victory on an artificial turf field.
Huntley committed only one error, and the Red Raider offense took advantage of four by Conant by coming up with a few key hits. Altergott had two of them.
Altergott came off the bench in the fourth and had a pinch-hit, one-out, two-run single to break a 1-1 tie. Huntley had tied it in the third when an error scored Brendan Fitzgerald.
Altergott’s hit to left-center off losing pitcher Brian Polaski chased home Bobby Hecker and Troy Cantu after a throwing error on Cantu’s attempt sacrifice put both into scoring position. Later, in a two-run sixth, Altergott’s infield single scored Trevor Symbal from second when he was running with the pitch.
“I was expecting to stay on the bench, keep warm and watch the game,” Altergott said. “But you never know.
“I was a little nervous my first at-bat on varsity I just hung in there and went with my guts and tried to get the ball in play and make good things happen.”
Conant had even less success with Huntley relievers Adam Kalish and Mason Martin than Luecht, failing to get a hit the final 1 2/3 innings. Each struck out a batter.
“I thought our pitching was outstanding today,” Huntley coach Andy Jakubowski said. “I thought all three guys did an outstanding job. Eric hit his pitch count at 75 pitches and as a staff we had two walks and 10 strikeouts.
So we’re very, very pleased with the way we came out and threw the baseball, came out and played well defensively and made one error.”
Conant wasn’t originally scheduled to be Huntley’s opponent. South Elgin had decided against playing in the severe cold.
“Just happy to get out here and get one under our belt after getting nine games cancelled,” Conant coach Derek Fivelson said. “The guys were excited. They got their first-game jitters out of the way defensively.
“We did a lot of things right. we had a nice two-out hit by Mike Matej in the first inning. We just have to build on stuff like that.”
