Columbus North is hoping the third time is not the charm for Center Grove.
The Class 4A No. 2 Bull Dogs have beaten the 4A No. 3 Trojans twice this baseball season, and they’ll look to make it three when the teams battle in the semifinals of the Jasper Semistate at 11 a.m. Saturday.
“Center Grove is a great team, and they’re young,” North coach Ben McDaniel said. “Coach (Keith) Hatfield has some full cupboards there. What I like about their team, is they’re not looking to next year. They’re not looking for their sophomores to be juniors and their juniors to be seniors. They’re wanting to make a run now.”
The Bull Dogs (27-4-1) beat the Trojans (28-4) 10-0 on April 3 in the Noblesville Tournament and 3-2 at home on May 20.
Center Grove played those games without standout junior shortstop Tyler Cerny. Cerny returned for the sectional and leads the Trojans with a .455 batting average.
“They have a lot of good athletes,” McDaniel said. “They have their starting shortstop back who was out for a couple months with some illnesses. They have some power bats, they have a ton of arms. They have like a college bullpen of arms, and they play solid defense.”
McDaniel is expecting to see senior Drue Young (7-0, 0.95 ERA) on the mound for Center Grove. North will counter with either senior Kyler McIntosh or junior Will Baker.
“We’re talking through the strategy a little bit,” McDaniel said. “They’ve seen Reese. They’ve seen Kyler. We’ve seen three different arms for them. My guess is, they’re going to throw their senior, Drue Young. He’s their go-to guy. He’s a good pitcher, and we have to find a way to get to him.”
McIntosh, who was picked as a North-South All-Star earlier this week, leads the Bull Dogs at the plate, along with senior catcher Austin Bode and senior first baseman Reese Harmon.
“Our defense continues to be our staple,” McDaniel said. “Our pitching has been fantastic for us. The bats are hot and cold. We need to have the bats hot for both games if we get to both games. We need to have some timely hits. We haven’t done a very good job. We’ve left a lot of guys on base this year.”
If North can get past Center Grove, it would play the winner of the second semifinal between Jasper (27-2) and Floyd Central (15-6) in the 8 p.m. final. The winner moves onto the state finals, which would be June 21 or 22 at Victory Field in Indianapolis.
“The regional is loaded,” McDaniel said. “I don’t know of any other regional that has the caliber of teams that the Jasper Regional has in it. Obviously, we’ve seen Center Grove twice. We’ve seen Floyd. We’ve never seen Jasper since I’ve been here. At this point, we’re not looking past Center Grove. That’s purely our focus. We know there’s two other talented teams down there, and if we get to play one of them, it will be a blessing.”
