Best 3-year run in school history but little playoff success for this NIC-10 baseball team
Hononegah has long been a NIC-10 baseball power. Even before it won 20 games 11 times in 12 years with eight regional titles between 2003 and 2014. But as good as Hononegah used to be, the Indians have reached an even higher level in recent years, winning five straight NIC-10 titles and their only two sectional titles in school history the last three years, including a fourth-place finish at state.
“We have finally figured out — or they have figured out as players — what it takes to win consistently at the level we want to,” Hononegah coach Matt Simpson said.
They aren’t the only ones. Freeport, quietly, has also been on a historic rise. The Pretzels had not had a winning record in 10 years before Shaun Dascher went 20-12 in his first year as coach in 2017. He has won or shared two league titles, Freeport’s only NIC-10 crowns since it’s fabled 1998 team went 30-4 behind future All-Big Ten pitchers Drew Dickinson and Matt Vorwald. This year’s team is 21-10 (12-5 NIC-10 with all records through Thursday's games), giving Freeport three straight 20-win seasons for the first time in school history.
More: IHSA playoff schedules for all Rockford-area baseball teams
Few have noticed. That’s because Freeport hasn’t won a regional title since 2012.
“I really want one,” Dascher said. “I am really hungry for one. I know the players are, too. We just need to get the stars to align.
“We are definitely finding ways to win throughout the year. Now we’re trying to take the next step and try to win the right ones.”
Freeport, a No. 4 seed, and No. 3 seed Boylan (20-11, 16-2) are the top area seeds in Class 3A regionals, where the semifinals are scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday. No. 3 seed Hononegah (22-6, 16-1), which plays No. 5 Harlem (15-12, 11-6) on Thursday, is the top-seeded team in Class 4A.
So no local team is seeded to win a large-school sectional. But they are not far off, either. The top local seeds in 3A are Sycamore (20-7, 9-5 Interstate Eight) and Lisle Benet (17-9, 7-5 East Suburban Catholic). The top seeds in 4A are three Fox Valley teams: Huntley (26-5, 14-4), Hampshire (21-10) and Algonquin Jacobs (20-11, 9-9). Hononegah was supposed to play all three but those games were all rained out.
More: NIC-10 baseball race takes dramatic turn in last game with walk-off win after trailing 9-1
In short, Rockford teams will be playoff underdogs by the time they reach sectionals, or even the regional finals, but only slightly so.
“Your synopsis is pretty close,” Boylan coach Matt Weber said. “We have played a lot of teams in there pretty close. A couple of them we have beat. A couple of them have pulled away from us at the end. I have to hope my guys will be ready to go.”
Boylan will open against Belvidere North, a team that knocked the Titans out of a share of first place in the conference with a walk-off 12-11 win Thursday.
“We are just trying to play our best baseball at the right time,” North coach Nolan Cusimano said.
That’s true for all five teams in the top half of the NIC-10. Harlem is led by Jackson Heidemann, who is fresh off his second perfect game of the season, shutting out Guilford last week. Boylan, in the words of Weber, looks to “avenge ourselves” in a rematch with Belvidere North. Hononegah looked to be weak on the mound when it lost Jackson Stahl, a first-team all-conference pick as a freshman last year, to injury before the season even began. But Hononegah was supposed to be thin on pitching last year too, only to see Stahl and then-freshman Nolan Mabie step up as Hononegah held opponents to 12 total runs in five playoff games.
“We’re very similar to what we were last year,” Hononegah’s Simpson said. “Even going into the postseason, we had question marks about what kind of starts we were going to get. They were at their best when we needed them most. If we have pitchers who step up again, there is no reason we can’t get back there. A lot of pressure is on our pitcher. But they know that.”
The pressure may be on Freeport most of all. So many good seasons. So many early playoff exits. Can the Pretzels finally have a postseason to match their regular season?
“If our defense stays intact — which has been our Achilles Heel in our losses — we can compete with anybody,” Dascher said. “Our sub-sectional is tough. Anybody could shock anybody in that sub-sectional. It takes a good week of baseball, but anybody can get there. We will keep plugging forward.”
This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Hononegah, Freeport try to continue historic runs in baseball playoffs
