Plus, his eyes kept darting in different directions.

Hmmmmm . . .

Nearby, his Cardinal O'Hara High baseball teammates had to be teasing him about doing an interview.

"Nah, they're talking about donkey," he said. "They want me to mention it."

Go right ahead.

"A 'donkey' is our team's word for a big hit," he said. "A couple of us came up with it. I'm not even sure exactly who it was, or even exactly how it got started. But that's the word we all use to describe a big hit - donkey."

Gotta love kids. They're always coming up with something.

As for Pace . . .

He's a 5-8, 165-pound junior catcher and yesterday he came up with one out and Tom Coyle (slicing single to right) on first base in the bottom of the seventh inning as O'Hara battled archrival Monsignor Bonner in a Catholic Red goodie.

The score was 2-2. Briefly, that is.

Pace, already 2-for-3 with a double and one RBI, added another two-bagger, chasing home Coyle and giving the Lions a 3-2 win.

First, the bench guys streamed onto the field to engulf Coyle. Then they trotted up the third-base line to pound away on Pace.

"Somebody got me on the head," he said. "It's a little sore."

Moral: Heroism hurts.

Pace's final act of impressive hitting came with a hint of an asterisk. Though the ball, delivered by reliever John Condo was stung, it was hit almost directly toward rightfielder Matt McGillian. The problem was, McGillian was looking right into a wicked sun and it was obvious by his actions - he first put his glove in front of his face, and got a late start in pursuit - that he did not immediately see the ball.

He might not have caught it anyway.

"[Condo] came in with a curveball on the first pitch, and I laid off it," Pace said. "Then he threw a fastball and missed his spot. It was middle-in.

"I hit it [to the opposite field] because I waited just a little extra to be sure I'd make contact. Once I saw it going out there, I knew Tom would score because he's pretty fast."

He's also a budding hitting coach.

Pace noted that he recently made two adjustments to his stance after absorbing suggestions from Coyle, who happens to be the son of first-year coach John Coyle.

"I'm seeing the ball better. Making more contact. Finding the gaps," Pace said. "I'm bending my knees more and dropping my hands a little lower. I first used Tommy's suggestion in BP. I was coming around, so then I tried it in the games."

Before his at-bat, Pace consulted with John Coyle.

A one-out sacrifice bunt by the No. 3 hitter would have been quite unorthodox strategy. Then again, the game was low scoring and O'Hara needed just one to end it . . .

"Coach just told me to try to make contact and move him along," Pace said.

Done . . . With a donkey.

"It's always a great feeling to get a walk-off hit," Pace said. "That it came against Bonner makes it even better. We had a decent crowd here, too, so that was nice."

Neither one of the starting senior lefties was around at the end.

O'Hara's Joe Sessa (four hits and strikeouts) departed after McGillian ripped a single to open the sixth. Russ Trojan then pitched shutout ball to earn the win. Bonner's Conor Kerins, still unbeaten, worked six full, surrendering nine hits and fanning 10.

In all, six of O'Hara's 11 hits went for extras. The others aside from Pace's were delivered by Kevin Sack (three doubles) and Andrew Onimus (RBI triple). Bill Hollingsworth (for an RBI) and Lou Tomasetti hammered doubles for Bonner.

Just after Pace mentioned that he also gets a kick out of playing solid defense and guiding the Lions' pitchers, a teammate walked over nearby and said, "Tell him that we have to listen to Taylor Swift's 'Our Song' before every game."

That's a story for another day. (Maybe . . . Probably not.) *