On the first pitch in the bottom of the first inning, Grayslake lead-off batter, Jack Gerbasi, was hit on the foot. It looked like starting pitcher Kaden Nichols was going to work his way out of a two-on, two-out jam, but Riley Policht blooped a double into short rightfield, driving in Gerbasi with the game’s first run.

“We just gave them too many free baserunners,” McNeely noted. “You can’t do that against a team like this. They have good hitters. When you also give them all those free baserunners, it just amplifies everything else. Our pitchers struggled to find the zone.”

It stayed 1-0 until the Rams started pulling away in the third.

Two lead-off walks led to a pair of runs. Again, it was a two-out hit, this time a two-run double into the left-centerfield gap by Garrett Guenther that made it 3-0.

Grayslake tacked on three more tallies in both the fourth and fifth to take complete control.

Two lead-off walks got things going in the fourth. Luke Mudd delivered a two-run double and Policht got his second RBI of the game with a two-out base hit.

In the fifth, the Rams combined three hits, a walk and an error to push three more runs across the plate and increase their advantage to 9-0.

“We’ve been playing at an elite level,” said Grayslake’s veteran coach Troy Whalen, who has amassed 494 wins in his 20-year career at the school. “We just take everything one game at a time. We’re a deep team and the guys really pull for each other.

“We are a baseball community” Whalen added. “If you thought we had a lot of people here today, just wait till tomorrow.”

While his teammates were providing plenty of run support, Rams starter Will Schufreider was also doing his part on the mound. Through the first five innings, the Hearts had just two baserunners – Cam Raddatz reached on an error with two outs in the first and Myles Maxedon was hit by a pitch leading off the fifth.

“Give credit where credit is due,” McNeely said. “He was in the zone with all three of his pitches. He worked more off his change-up than we thought he would. It was just one of those days. We couldn’t find any timely hits. We haven’t had one of those games in the last two weeks.”

Schufreider was confident after his pre-game warmup session in the bullpen.

“I kind of worked backwards today,” the senior righthander, who entered the game with 1.92 ERA for the season, explained. “Everything today started with my curveball. It was my strength. I had a lot of late break on both my curve and my change-up.”

He knew he had a no-hitter through five innings, “but that wasn’t what I was thinking about. I was just trying to make one pitch at a time and get back to the dugout as quickly as possible.”

Hearts senior Quest Hull also mentioned how effective Schufreider was.

“He pitched very well,” Hull said. “His change-up looked like a fastball until the very end. There was a lot of movement on his pitches.”

The chance for a no-hitter ended in the sixth. Nichols led off with a walk and went to second when Jack Harper grounded out. Kaden Koeberlein then lined a single into center and Nichols raced home with the run.

Schufreider was pulled after 5.2 innings. The Hearts got two hits off reliever Fikret Dumas in the seventh. Colton Webb lined a base hit to start the inning, but a line drive snagged by Dumas off the bat of Evan Waymoth resulted in a double play. Spencer Fox then doubled to the leftfield wall with two outs.

The Rams, who improved to 33-7, will now face Nazareth Academy (33-6) for the state championship. Nazarath Academy reached the final game with a 3-0 win over Sycamore. Game time will be at approximately 11:30 a.m.

The Hearts will play Sycamore in the third place game. It is scheduled to start at 9 a.m. Saturday.

Despite the loss, Coach McNeely and the players were still aware of their accomplishment and were excited about playing another game on Saturday.

“Making it to the state tournament is a testament to how hard these kids have worked the last three to four years,” McNeely said. “The kids have bought into this program and I am so proud of them.”

“Nobody expected us to be here,” Hull added. “But we still have a chance to get one tomorrow.”

“The run we’ve made means more to us than most people know,” senior Jack Harper continued. “An Effingham team hasn’t been to the state tournament since 1942. That makes this special. And when we walk into the gym, we’ll see that banner hanging there for the rest of our lives.”

“We’ve been playing together since we were 8 years old,” senior Myles Maxedon noted. “We don’t want that to end, but we know it will tomorrow.”

McNeely also expressed his appreciation for the support the community has shown the team.

“It’s been awesome,” the fourth-year coach said. “It’s been a long time since a baseball team from our school reached this stage. The support these kids have received means a lot.

“Things didn’t go our way today, so we’ll need to have a short-term memory,” McNeely added. “We’ve still got a big game tomorrow. It will be one more opportunity to be around this team and one final time to coach these seniors. I’m really looking forward to that.”