Crestwood's Wyatt Januska, Charlie Sommer a winning duo on the gridiron, baseball diamond

ATWATER TWP. — Charlie Sommer threw for over 1,000 yards this season for Crestwood's football team.

Wyatt Januska was one of Sommer's leading receivers.

They're back together this spring and once again making big plays for the Red Devils, this time on the diamond.

Once again, Sommer set Januska up perfectly, this time with a single down the first-base line that put the latter 90 feet away from scoring the game-winning run in the top of the seventh.

Januska took care of the rest, darting home on a ball in the dirt to secure a 5-4 victory over host Waterloo Friday afternoon.

"Getting better with every step we take," Januska said of his yearlong connection with Sommer.

Januska's winning run hardly sounds crazy except for the fact that the Vikings have one of the shortest backstops in Portage County. On several occasions Friday, balls went to the backstop and runners smartly froze on second or third, not daring to risk the quick carom.

So when that ball went to the backstop in the seventh, nearly everyone in the ballpark assumed Januska would stay planted.

"I didn't think Wyatt would be at home," said Sommer, who made the far less risky sprint from first to second on that same ball to the backstop. "I look over and he's scoring. Everyone's cheering. It was a great time."

And then Sommer, the Red Devils' quarterback in the fall and ace in the spring, closed the game out on the mound with his fourth strong inning of relief work.

"Coach said, 'Do you want the last inning?'" Sommer said. "I said, 'Of course I do,' and then we just fight to the end."

Wyatt Januska shows extreme intelligence for Crestwood

The context makes the play even better and the win even sweeter.

Consider that the Red Devils won just four games all of last season.

Consider that Sommer and Januska both hit well under .200 last season.

"I think it's huge," Sommer said. "I think we both are disappointed in our seasons last year, but that's in the past. We're here. We've been [putting in] a lot of work in the off-season."

Januska struck out in his first three at-bats Friday but bounced back to work a four-pitch walk with two outs in the seventh. He then showed great headiness in racing from first to third on Sommer's drive down the opposite-field line.

"Coming off two strikeouts earlier, just it was a 2-2 count, so I just needed to protect the plate," Sommer said. "It was an outside pitch, so I kind of just took it there and it fell."

Januska showed even more headiness once he got to third.

"He asked me to call time for an injury so he could catch his breath," Crestwood coach Chris Stanley said. "A little gamesmanship out of Wyatt there, and I told him as we were walking through the injury, so to speak, I said, 'If the ball hits the dirt, you can beat the catcher back to the plate.' He got a great jump and obviously scored."

Bobby Bradley, Jake Eyerman exemplify Crestwood's resourcefulness

The Red Devils showed similar poise in the bottom of the seventh when the Vikings beat out a grounder with a runner on second and one out. As the batter, Kyle Werbeck, tapped first base just ahead of the throw, the second-base runner tore toward home with the potential tying run.

Crestwood first baseman Jake Eyerman was alert and unruffled, sending a perfect throw home to catcher Bobby Bradley, who made the tag.

Again, the context made it more remarkable.

Friday marked Bradley's first time playing catcher in high school. He was there because Steven Lincoln, who caught the Red Devils' first two games, was on the mound. Oh, and because of an injury to Cooper Pausch, who was originally projected to start at catcher this year. Bradley learned he was Friday's starting catcher on the way to Waterloo.

Per Bradley, "I was surprised when [Coach] told us on the bus."

All Bradley did upon getting off the bus was catch a couple of tricky pop-ups, block a bunch of balls in the dirt and boom a couple of shots at the plate, one which dropped and one which didn't. Bradley's ability to take on a new position is something the Red Devils will need all year.

"They rep a lot at every position because we have to be a versatile group," Stanley said. "We only have 12 uniformed players, so there are several guys who are going to be playing four and five different positions at any point in a game."

While Friday's game wasn't pretty at times, the resourcefulness and poise late bode well for the Red Devils as they're already halfway toward last year's win total.

"They have to have a taste of success to understand how to replicate it," Stanley said. "For this young group with no seniors, it's huge because these young men have to be leaders sooner than later in order for us to get where we need to be as a program."

This article originally appeared on Record-Courier: Crestwood's Wyatt Januska, Charlie Sommer shine in football, baseball