{"id":299097,"date":"2026-05-19T02:55:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T02:55:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/299097\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T02:55:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T02:55:09","slug":"johnsburg-celebrates-krc-title-by-beating-plano-shaw-local","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/299097\/","title":{"rendered":"Johnsburg celebrates KRC title by beating Plano \u2013 Shaw Local"},"content":{"rendered":"

All Carter Block wanted to do this spring was wear a Johnsburg<\/a> baseball uniform and enjoy his friends. As quarterback of the football team the past two seasons, he helped lead the Skyhawks to 13 wins and back-to-back state playoff berths.<\/p>\n

He hadn\u2019t played baseball since middle school. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a great kid that is friends with everybody and just wants to be part of the team,\u201d Johnsburg coach Eric Toussaint said. \u201cHe came up to me in basketball and said, \u2018I\u2019m thinking about going out for baseball.\u2019 I said, \u2018All right, well, probably, at best, you\u2019ll be a pinch runner or courtesy runner.\u2019 He said, \u2018It\u2019s fine, Coach. I just want to be with my friends. I love what you guys do. I want to be part of that.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

On Monday against visiting Plano<\/a>, Block started in right field, which he\u2019s done more of than pinch run this season. He capped a four-run first inning with an RBI single and finished 2 for 2, helping Johnburg win the Kishwaukee River Conference championship for the second year in a row with a 9-2 win.<\/p>\n

\u201dI definitely worked at [baseball], like going to open gyms before the season,” Block said after also getting hit by a pitch and scoring. \u201cI know I\u2019m athletic. I just kept working hard, listening to Coach [Ryan] Linkletter and Coach Toussaint, and working on my craft, and I eventually got myself a spot in the lineup. I was happy about that.\u201d <\/p>\n

How happy were the Skyhawks after clinching the KRC title? They mobbed winning pitcher Peyton Mesce after he got his eighth strikeout on his 103rd pitch to end the game. Teammate Shane Conlon sped out of the dugout to douse Mesce with ice water from the Gatorade jug, and the coaching staff surprised the players with Skyhawk-blue T-shirts noting their back-to-back KRC championships.<\/p>\n

Johnsburg (19-9, 11-2) wraps up conference action with a trip to Plano on Wednesday. For Block, who saw mop-up minutes during the basketball season after not playing the sport his sophomore and junior years, the title gave him what eluded him in his two other sports this school year.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously I\u2019ve always wanted to win one in football,\u201d said Block, the prolific passer. \u201cBut this means as much, if not more. Winning a conference championship is awesome, and hopefully we can keep it going with regionals and getting to sectionals, supersectionals and more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Plano (12-18-1, 3-10) had no plans of handing Johnsburg the title. The Reapers loaded the bases with one out in the first inning but managed only a sacrifice fly from Justin Bishop. <\/p>\n

The visitors touched Mesce for three hits in the second but didn\u2019t score.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re extremely young this year,\u201d Reapers coach Tyler Mulligan, who\u2019s young himself at 28, said after playing three freshmen and three sophomores. \u201cWe\u2019re competing at a high level, but our hitting\u2019s not as timely right now. We got to figure out in that moment where it\u2019s, \u2018Now that the runners are on, how do we get them in every single time?\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Plano got another run in the fifth on an RBI single by sophomore Julian Gates, after Braylon Schmidt greeted Mesce with a leadoff triple to deep right-center. But Mesce helped limit the damage by triggering a 1-6-3 double play.<\/p>\n

\"Johnsburg<\/p>\n

Johnsburg pitcher Peyton Mesce delivers to the plate against Plano in a Kishwaukee River Conference baseball game Monday, May 18, 2026, in Johnsburg. (Joe Aguilar)<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought it was a struggle at the start, and then it just kept going up [getting better] until the end of the game,\u201d Mesce said of his performance.<\/p>\n

Plano had 10 hits, including three from sophomore catcher Sean Garton and two apiece from Schmidt, who also doubled, and Gates.<\/p>\n

Johnburg\u2019s 11-hit attack featured two hits apiece from Block, Ashton Stern (RBI double) and Jack Thompson (RBI double, run-scoring single). Jacob Smith singled home two runs in the first, and freshman Lukas Thompson smoked a two-run double in the third. <\/p>\n

The left-handed Gates started on the mound for Plano and was followed by sophomore lefty Nathan Tunt and freshman southpaw Nathan Corral.<\/p>\n

\u201cLots of youth on the team and a lot of experience that has been given to them throughout the season to make sure they\u2019re ready for next year,\u201d Mulligan said. <\/p>\n

Reapers leadoff man Eric Nunez (1 for 4) reached on an error to start the seventh, but Mesce retired the next three batters. He stuck out Quentin Santoria (1 for 3) swinging to end it. With Mesce\u2019s pitch count over 100, Santoria was going to be his last batter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe debated back and forth on that, but it was his game,\u201d Toussaint said. \u201cHe wanted it. We had two kids in the dugout saying that they wanted to go in. But how do you pull a kid that has been there for us all year, wants to finish it and wants to have the celebration?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"All Carter Block wanted to do this spring was wear a Johnsburg baseball uniform and enjoy his friends.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":299098,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[1816,612,1442,160,162,161,41688,599],"class_list":["post-299097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-plano","tag-baseball","tag-johnsburg-preps","tag-kendall-county-front-headlines","tag-plano","tag-plano-headlines","tag-plano-news","tag-plano-preps","tag-premium"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/299098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}