Zach McLean
BLOOMINGTON — Columbus North’s hopes of a deep tournament run went by the wayside Wednesday night.
The Bull Dogs outhit East Central 9-3, but had trouble coming up with a timely hit. On the other hand, two of the Trojans’ hits were home runs, and East Central shocked the defending sectional champions 5-4 in the opening round of the Bloomington South Sectional.
We had our opportunities with guys on base in scoring position that we didn’t capitalize on,” North coach Pat Antone said. “That’s baseball.”
The Bull Dogs (18-7-1) were cruising along with a 1-0 lead after three innings. Luke Harmon had a no-hitter through three, but allowed a two-run homer in the bottom of the fourth.
After North scored a pair of runs in the fifth to take a 3-2 lead, Antone brought in ace Will Baker in the bottom of the fifth, and he walked a pair of batters. Those runners ended up scoring, and the Trojans regained the lead at 4-3.
“It was my fault,” Antone said. “We make the pitching change in the fifth inning after we had taken the lead. I shouldn’t have done that. I should have left Luke in. Baker’s shoulder has been a little sore, so we’ve been kind of nursing that, trying to get him healthy. That one’s totally on me.”
East Central made it 5-3 with a home run in the bottom of the sixth. That run proved to be huge when the Bull Dogs’ Zach McLean led off the seventh with a homer.
The Trojans then got the next three batters to ground out to short to end the game.
“The goal was to win the state championship,” Antone said. “It was a good year, but disappointing at the same time.”
Harmon, Baker and Dyllan Redmon combined on a three-hitter for North.
“Luke did an outstanding job,” Antone said. “He put us in a position to win. We just have to come through in a couple of those situations offensively.”
The Bull Dogs will lose five seniors from this year’s team that shared the Conference Indiana title.
“I really enjoyed this group that we had,” Antone said. “The seniors, I hope they enjoyed it, as well, and learned a lot along the way and enjoyed it. We’re going to be able to take some things away from this experience moving forward. We’re going to be frothing at the mouth to come back next year.”
