I’m in the bleachers at Cary-Grove High School, hands feeling like frozen Eggos, the sky is turning a darker shade of gray, and the NCAA national championship game is tipping off in an hour. This game between Cary-Grove and Fremd should’ve been over a long time ago, and the guy to my left keeps talking about extra innings.
Yes, my mental state is about to be downgraded from agitation to a backhanded waffle across the jowls.
But wait: Fremd punches three across in the top of the seventh to break an 8-8 tie – extra innings likely out of the picture. Maybe not. C-G opens the bottom half with three straight singles, which elicits another extra-inning joke, and then a run-scoring groundout to make it 11-9.
Hold on: here comes Kyle Williams to plate. No way, no possible way. I mean, Williams has already hit a grand slam to get C-G back into the game, doubled, singled twice and scored four times in his four previous plate appearances. No way he can do it again.
I stand up, fumble with the video camera, and hope that Kyle Williams does something that would somehow make missing the national title game OK. He works the count to 2-0. Then the left-handed hitting Williams spins on a fastball and jerks it high into the charcoal sky for, you betcha, a walk-off three-run homer and a surprisingly thrilling 12-11 victory. (Click Here to see the Video Highlight)
If you’re keeping count, that’s 5-for-5, seven RBI, five runs scored and two clutch, cold-remedying home runs. But there’s more. As it turns out, Williams also went 5-for-5 in his last game, only then he tallied four doubles, a home run and three runs scored.
While Dick Vitale is looking cross-eyed into the camera breaking down the Kansas-Memphis game, I’m standing next to the hottest ticket in town, a 5-foot-11, 155-pound second baseman who could slay a dragon with his bat, much less a high-school pitcher.
Think the kid would be foaming at the mouth with excitement, right? His first words, librarian-quiet and Fonzie-cool: “I just did what we needed to do to win.” Later, he adds that he’s “seeing the ball really well” (no kidding!) and, finally, what I’m guessing is the reason why Cary-Grove is an unexpected 9-0: “The best part about it all is we’re winning games.”
As I walk to my car – and for most of the time trying to find my way out of Cary – I didn’t give a thought about my shriveled hands or about the national championship game, for that matter. I had seen something remarkable, spoken to a kid with remarkable perspective.
Kyle Williams had cemented a lifetime memory. And so did I.