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Kelly graduate pitches Squirrels past Cape
CHARLESTON -- Stellar pitching, outstanding defense and a knack for manufacturing runs propelled the Charleston Fighting Squirrels past Cape, 5-0 in a second round game of the Missouri Senior Babe Ruth State Tournament on Friday at Hillhouse Park in Charleston.
The Squirrels (28-14) were scheduled to play Mineral Area in the winner's bracket semifinals on Saturday. The tournament will continue today and possibly tomorrow with the "if necessary" game. Results from the rest of tournament will be in Monday's edition.
On Friday, Charleston continued its success against Cape, winning for the fifth time in seven games this summer.
Dallas Tew, a Kelly High School graduate, kept the Cape bats in check while letting his defense make the routine plays in the shutout win.
In what marks one of Tew's greatest pitching performances, Squirrels coach Michael Minner was ecstatic after the game.
"Incredible," he said of Tew. "That's the kind of performance you need out of a young man whenever you're in the winner's bracket. He stepped up. Our defense played great today, but it's because he pumped strikes. He made some big pitches and got some key strikeouts, and allowed the defense to do the rest. It was a big-time performance in a game when we needed a big performance."
Tew threw the entire seven innings, allowing just three hits and two walks. He struck out five.
The Charleston defense helped out by playing errorless ball and turning a crucial 4-3 double play with the bases loaded in the bottom of the second inning. Second baseman Brink Naile did the hard part as he fielded the ball, stepped on second, and then firing to first baseman Taylor White to finish the job.
"We left some runners on base early and missed a few chances," said Cape coach Steve Dirnberger. "We just couldn't get the big hit when we needed it. We scored 16 runs against these guys a week ago and we got zero today. But we haven't faced Dallas Tew yet this year. Some of them faced him in school ball, but he did a good job. He had us off stride. We couldn't hit him."
Cape pitcher Justin Myers threw a solid game as well, limiting the Squirrels to five hits in 5 1/3 innings.
Charleston scored in the top of the first after Paul Johnson walked, stole second, advanced to third on a single, and scored on a fielder's choice-RBI by Tommy Starr.
The score remained 1-0 until the top of the sixth as Charleston blew the game open with "small-ball." The Squirrels put down four successful sacrifice bunts which led to three runs in the inning.
It all started with a single by White, who was then pinch-run for by Jarryd Smith, who promptly advanced to second on a wild pitch.
Starr then laid down a sacrifice bunt. Myers fielded it, but threw it wild into foul territory when he tried to nab Smith at third. Smith then trotted home to give Charleston a 2-0 lead. Starr advanced to second on the error.
Paul Bucher then put down a sacrifice bunt, but Myers once again could not get the lead runner at third, keeping everybody safe. After a pop out, Minner called for the suicide squeeze. Chase McClendon got the bunt down, allowing Starr to score as Cape catcher Jacob Valleroy fielded it without a throw.
Following a balk by Myers, another suicide squeeze led to an error by Myers as he tried to scoop the ball to home plate but it went wild, allowing Bucher to score to make it 4-0.
"We just kind of fell apart," said Dirnberger. "We didn't handle that very well. We made some bad decisions. But even taking that out of the equation, we were still beat 1-0."
Minner said his team needed the boost after going scoreless for four straight innings.
"We weren't doing much offensively," said Minner. "But we bunt the ball real well. That's one of the things that we work on a lot. We got the job done in a crucial inning. We were going to keep doing it until they stopped us."
Charleston added another run in the top of the seventh as Starr reached on an error and advanced to third with aggressive running following a single by Bucher.
Tew brought him home with a sacrifice fly.
Charleston stole five bases in the game, including two by Johnson.
"When you're not swinging the bats the way you want to, you've got to take advantage of every opportunity you get offensively," said Minner of the aggressive running. "We're pretty quick on the bases and we try to use that and move up as much as we can. Every run that we scored today was well-
earned. That's the sign of a good team when you can get it done offensively like that."
With the loss, Cape (15-9) was forced to play again Friday night in the loser's bracket against Northeast Missouri.
Abe Dirnberger, Blake Gaddis and Brett Heischmidt had Cape's lone hits.
Myers took the loss, allowing four runs (one earned) with three walks and one strikeout.
"Justin pitched a good game, but you're not going to win many games if you don't score runs, obviously," said Dirnberger.
Tyler Propst pitched the final 1 2/3 innings in relief of Myers, allowing one hit and one unearned run.
Charleston collected six hits total with White going 3-4 to lead the charge. Bucher and McClendon each had bunt singles on their sacrifice attempts. Johnson had a single to left field for the Squirrels' other hit.