Saving face. Kaneland coach Madison Mikos takes quick action to avoid serious injury from line drive hit into dugout

This was one scary moment.

It was also the defensive play of the game, even though it had no impact on the outcome.

For first-year Kaneland coach Madison Mikos, whose team was playing an eagerly anticipated nonconference game at West Aurora, it was a lesson learned.

“I coached over here for two years, I should know better,” said Mikos, who this season succeeded retired Knights coach Mike Kuefler but still teaches physical education at West Aurora.

In the bottom of the first inning, Mikos was sitting on a five-gallon ball bucket in the door-wide opening of the chain link fence in front of the visitors’ dugout.

Ionicca Rivera, one of her former players, checked her swing on a pitch from Kaneland freshman Brynn Woods and the ball met bat, sending a rocket line drive at Mikos’ face.

The coach, a 2015 sectional champion with St. Charles North, exhibited good reflexes and lifted her left hand in time for her wrist to take the brunt of the ball’s impact as she fell off the bucket.

Kaneland’s eventual 9-6 victory was no longer a consideration for many of the stunned observers, initially uncertain if Mikos had avoided serious injury.

Trainer Tonya Juarez arrived on the scene and walked Mikos behind the dugout.

“She’s my office mate,” Mikos said. “I call her my work mom. She goes, ‘Well, coach, you gonna be good?’

“I said, ‘I’m fine. Rub some dirt on it. Wrap me up. Let’s go. I’m not missing this game.’”

Juarez braced the wrist, gave Mikos some ice and that was that. She did drive herself home to DeKalb after the game and got X-rays, revealing a broken hand.

An inning later, after returning to the coaching box at third base, Mikos even tried to make a barehanded pickup of a slow roller in foul territory with the other hand.

Senior pitcher Alyssa Perkins had batted before Rivera for the Blackhawks and hit her third home run of the season, a solo shot and the career-best 19th for the program.

“Alyssa hits some massive line drives,” West Aurora coach Randy Hayslett said. “She was robbed of her freshman year by COVID or she probably would be closer to 30.”

Sophomore shortstop Sara Tarr hit a solo homer, her first of the season, to lead off the fourth inning for the Blackhawks (3-2).

In between, Kaneland (5-4) batted around in the second and third innings to score five and four runs, respectively, four unearned due to infield miscues.

Senior third baseman Emily Olp highlighted the second inning with a triple on a blast high off the right field fence.

In the third inning, senior catcher and Wisconsin-Stevens Point commit MacKenzie Hardy belted a two-run double that reached the fence in right.

“Brynn has a lot of movement and has really good off-speed pitches,” Hardy said of her battery mate. “They hit those two, but she handled it really well.”

Mikos said the youngster has a bright future.

“She’s very poised — these girls can hit,” Mikos said of West Aurora. “Brynn is in a very good place, and she’s going to get better.”

Tarr was impressed.

“She was really hitting those corners,” Tarr said of Woods. “And she could mix speeds well, too.

“It feels good to get out here and play. We’ve had more games canceled than we’ve played.”

West Aurora did rally for four runs off Woods in the fifth, but all of them coming with two outs after an infield error.

Mikos summoned senior pitcher Morgan Iwanski to close it out.

Tarr struck out for the first time this season with the tying runs on base and two out in the sixth inning.

“We played too sloppy at the beginning of the game,” Hayslett said. “We battled back, but I wish we could have made a few more plays earlier.”

Afterward, Juarez checked on Mikos.

“It hurts and in my fingers a little more now,” said Mikos, preparing to drive herself to her home. “My girls know I don’t quit, but I will not be sitting there again.”