SHELBYVILLE — Columbus East had trouble getting on base the first five innings against Bloomington South’s Wil Stockman Wednesday night, but in the sixth, the Olympians broke through.
With the game tied 1-1, East batted around in the sixth, scoring five times. That enabled the Olympians to come away with a 6-1 victory in the opening round of the Shelbyville Sectional.
“Stockman is a good pitcher, and he’s shut down a lot of people this year,” East coach Jon Gratz said. “We finally scratched together a couple there. We kept battling and battling and staying positive. We waited a little longer than was ideal, but obviously, we’ll take it.”
The Olympians (18-7) move on to Friday’s semifinals where they will play at 6 p.m. against the winner of Wednesday’s late game between Shelbyville and East Central. Columbus North will meet Bloomington North in Friday’s second semifinal, and the title game is at 6 p.m. Monday.
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Cole Gilley limited the Panthers (9-18) to three hits and did not allow an earned run.
“I felt really good,” Gilley said. “I just kept battling, and the defense ended up making some good plays behind me. That really helped a lot.”
East got on the board on a crazy play in the fourth. Josh Major led off with a single, and Dalton Back was hit by a pitch. With one out, Gilley hit a blooper into shallow right field that Bloomington South second baseman Trent Richardson made a diving attempt to catch.
Major went halfway to third, and when umpires ruled the ball hit the ground, went to third. The throw to third got away, and Major came home with the game’s first run, while Back went to third. Gilley headed back to the dugout thinking the ball had been caught and was ruled out for leaving the base, the the Panthers escaped without further damage.
Bloomington South tied the game in the fifth when Grant Smethurst smacked a two-out double and scored on an error. But the Olympians took command in the sixth.
Back led off the sixth with an infield single, went to second on a hit by Drew Hasson and took third when Gilley was hit by a pitch to load the bases. Nash Murphy then walked to force in a run, and freshman Parker Harrison followed with a two-run single to make it 4-1 and end Stockman’s evening.
“I wasn’t really nervous,” Harrison said. “I just had confidence in myself to get the job done. My mindset was just to get a base hit and try to get some runs in so we could get a bigger lead for Cole.”
But East wasn’t done. Panthers reliever Reid Sills walked Alec Burnett to reload the bases with still nobody out. Murphy came home on a wild pitch, and Harrison scored when Klayton Brummett reached on an error.
Gilley then retired Bloomington South in the seventh to preserve the win.
“At the end of the games, we’re usually really good,” Gilley said. “We really stepped up at the end and got in (Stockton’s) head a little bit and got him a little frustrated, and he started walking a lot of guys, and we ended up putting the ball in play and getting some runs.”
