DENHAM SPRINGS – Jesuit scored eight second-inning runs Friday in its Class 5A quarterfinal against Acadiana.

It needed nearly every one of them.

The Blue Jays allowed the Wrecking Rams to chip away at the lead, and cut it to two runs in the seventh inning before senior Stephen Lukinovich shut down the rally.

By Bradley Handwerger / WWL-TV.com

Jesuit's Scott Cronin reaches for first as Acadiana first baseman Tyler Yockey catches the ball. Cronin was out on the play, but Jesuit held off Acadiana for a 9-7 win to move into the 5A semifinals at 2 p.m. Saturday. The Blue Jays play the winner of the Dutchtown-Catholic.

Jesuit won 9-7 at A.B. Netterville Field at North Park, moving into the semifinals for the fifth straight year.

Even with the eight-spot in the second, Blue Jays head coach Tim Parenton knew the game was far from over.

“All day long,” Parenton said. “What they did to Rummel, putting up the six-spot in the seventh inning, we knew they were capable of it.”

Though the second inning put Jesuit up 8-0, the game was far from over, though it seemed it at the time.

You wouldn’t have known at the time that Mason Katz’s three-run shot over the left-field wall that gave Jesuit a 7-0 lead would have been the deciding factor in the game.

“I was just trying to do my job, just trying to get a hit and keep the inning going,” said Katz, who went 1-for-3 with three RBIs. “I had no idea my three-run home run was going to be a big difference.”

Meanwhile, Jesuit starting pitcher Jordan Rittiner (8-4) was cruising, scattering two hits over the first three innings. The second inning helped.

“A lot,” he said. “It made me a lot more comfortable on the mound. I started making better pitches and letting them hit the ball.”

Jesuit (25-10) added another run in the fourth when Chad Guidry drove in Cory Guidry for a 9-0 lead.

Acadiana (30-7-1) picked up two runs off the lead in the bottom half of the inning, taking advantage of three hits, a walk and a wild pitch.

And then the wheels started to come off the track for Jesuit and starting pitcher Jordan Rittiner.

In the bottom of the sixth, the Blue Jays committed two errors that helped lead to four Wrecking Rams runs. It cut Jesuit’s lead to 9-6, but Rittiner struck out Corey Broussard to end the inning and the threat.

“Jordan wasn’t hitting all his pitches,” Parenton said. “It’s hard to pitch with an eight-run lead. You’re just trying to get them to swing the bat. They made some adjustments and hit the balls the other way.”

Acadiana reliever Jeb Stefan sat down all three Jesuit batters in the top of the seventh, and Parenton brought in David Hatfield.After getting the first batter of the inning out, Hatfield gave up a deep homer to left-center and all of a sudden, it was a two-run game with only one out.

Parenton brought in Lukinovich and Acadiana’s chances vanquished.

“I really felt like we would win until the last pitch,” Acadiana coach Scott McCullough said. “To come back and hit the ball like we did and get to 10 hits, we dug ourselves too big a hole. Jesuit is a good baseball team and a good program.”