Headed to state

ONLinenews:
KOKOMO -- Central Catholic hasn't wasted any time jumping on opponents in this postseason.

The Knights have scored in the first inning of every tournament game. CC has totaled 12 first-inning runs and 18 in the second inning. The Knights led 11-0 after two innings of Saturday's 14-0 Class A Kokomo Semistate victory over Fort Wayne Blackhawk.

"They were straight on from the get-go, just getting runs for me," winning pitcher Taylor Glaze said. "That's exactly what I need as a pitcher. It gets my mindset set for the game and helps me relax a lot. I couldn't have asked for anything better."

Including a 25-1 regional championship victory over Randolph Southern, Central Catholic has scored 39 runs in its last 10 innings. The Knights have scored eight or more runs in every tournament game but one.

"What we've done better than anything come tournament time is we've stayed within ourselves up at the plate," CC coach Tim Bordenet said. "We didn't try to do anything that we're not capable of doing. Just stay back and hit the ball hard somewhere and good things will happen."

Spoiler alert

Even Central Catholic's young players are aware of the baseball superstition that forbids talking about a no-hitter in progress.

So the Knights placed partial blame for Glaze's near-perfect game on assistant coach Tim Whiteaker. According to CC's players, Whiteaker gathered the seniors in the top of the fifth and made them aware Glaze had not allowed a baserunner.

Blackhawk cleanup hitter Ryan Hartsough lashed Glaze's first pitch up the middle for a clean single.

"We were joking around in the dugout, because one of our coaches ruined the no-hitter by talking about it," designated hitter Austin Munn said. "He pitched a heckuva game for sure."

Short porch

Munn, a sophomore who bats from the left side, tried to ignore the sign down the right field line at Highland Park that tantalizingly read '270.'

The park's short right field extends to 370 feet in the alley. Munn took a Matt Kaplanis pitch out to right for a grand slam in the second and almost repeated the feat the next inning.

His bases-loaded drive in the third sailed just wide of the foul pole, however, and he finished the at-bat with a sacrifice fly to spacious center field.

"I was trying just to hit singles, but I got the pitch I liked and I just tried to drive it," Munn said of the slam, his third home run of the season and second in as many games.

Back in action

Central Catholic senior Jason Aldridge sat out last Saturday's regional championship over Randolph Southern. Earlier that day, the first baseman took a fastball to the helmet from Cowan's Justin O'Conner in a regional semifinal victory.

Bordenet said after the semifinal that Aldridge had sustained a concussion. Aldridge received clearance on Wednesday to play.