Columbus East threw a two-headed monster at Bedford North Lawrence Monday night in the first round of the Hoosiers Hills Conference Tournament, and the Stars had absolutely no answer for it.
Cole Gilley and Julian Greenwell combined to throw a one-hit shutout for the Olympians, who cruised to a 4-0 victory.
Gilley started for East, throwing four innings of one-hit ball, while striking out four without walking a batter. Not to be outdone, Greenwell came into the game in the fifth inning, throwing three innings without allowing a hit, striking out four and walking one to finish out the victory.
“I thought I threw the ball pretty well tonight,” Gilley said. “I left a couple of balls up that they squared up, but the defense played great and tracked down everything. I felt really loose before the game, so I was happy with the velocity on my fastball. The hit I allowed was on a change-up that I left up in the zone. That’s a feel pitch that I’m still working on.”
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Gilley struck out four of the first six batters he faced and then allowed the defense to help him out.
Greenwell also thought he threw well.
“I tweaked a few things before the game, and I think that helped me tonight,” he said. “My velocity was good, and the velocity on my breaking ball was also good tonight. I mostly threw my two-seam fastball, though.”
Offensively, the Olympians (12-6) didn’t have to do much. After threatening in the second, putting runners on first and third with nobody out, but coming up empty, they broke through in the third. After two quick outs to start the inning, Drew Hasson reached on an infield hit and stole second.
On the steal, the throw to second went into center field, allowing Hasson to reach third. That was followed by another infield hit by Dalton Back, scoring East’s first run.
The Olympians were able to pad their lead in the fourth. Josh Major led off with his second single of the night. After stealing second and moving to third on a pitch in the dirt, Major scored on the Stars’ second error of the night, a throwing error on a Klayton Brummett ground ball.
Brummett then scored on a solid single Jonah Wichman to give East a 3-0 lead. The Olympians tacked on another run in the bottom of the sixth on Wichman’s second RBI of the game, scoring Parker Harrison with the fourth and final run.
“Those guys are good,” said East coach Jon Gratz, speaking about Gilley and Greenwell. “Our plan was to get Gilley four and Greenwell three, and we were able to do that tonight.”
Gratz also was pleased with the play of his defense.
“Our defense is getting better,” he said. “It’s a lot better than it was at the beginning of the year when we were making some errors we shouldn’t have been making.”
East will host Madison in Wednesday’s semifinals.
