Tyler Blythe
After getting shut out by Class 4A No. 4 Cathedral on Friday night, the Columbus North baseball team was hoping to avoid a repeat Saturday morning against Terre Haute South.
The Bull Dogs made sure of that from the beginning. They scored eight times in the first inning and went on to post an 11-1, five-inning Conference Indiana victory.
“(Friday) night, we were hoping to pull off a good upset,” senior center fielder Tyler Blythe said. “Obviously, we didn’t hit the ball well, so coach told us to come out here, and even though it was going to be a lesser opponent, we had to still come out and give it to them. “I think the coaches have done a great job implementing different drills and focusing on our hitting because our defense is solid right now, and our pitching is starting to pick back up,” Blythe said. “We need to focus on hitting, and we’ve done a good job of that the last couple games, besides (Friday) night.”
Blythe went 3 for 3 with a double to lead Columbus North (9-7, 2-1) at the plate. Connor Hensley did the job on the mound, throwing a five-hitter with eight strikeouts.
“I felt good,” Hensley said. “Some other games, I wasn’t being as aggressive, but today, they were a good hitting team, and we were just going to try to be aggressive and get some weak outs.”
“He was cruising right along,” Bull Dogs coach Mike Bodart added. “He spread the hits out. He didn’t hurt himself with walks, and he was real efficient today. We’re real happy with that performance.”
Connor Hensley
Hensley helped himself in the first inning when he put Columbus North on the board with an RBI-single off Patriot starter Bryson Carpenter. Luke Harmon also had an RBI-single, and Blythe added an RBI-double for the Bull Dogs, who took advantage of four Terre Haute North errors in the inning.
Columbus North tacked on three more runs in the second on an error, a wild pitch and a Dillon James sacrifice fly.
Terre Haute North scored its run in the third, but Hensley shut the Patriots down the rest of the way.
“We executed better today than we did (Friday) night, so it was a great way to bounce back from a not-so-good way to play (Friday) night,” Hensley said. “It was a great way to win today.”
Zach McLean went 2 for 2 for the Bull Dogs.
“We put the bat on the ball,” Bodart said. “They had a couple errors, but we had good, hard hits. What we tell them is, we want to force the other team to make some plays, and fortunately for us, Terre Haute North struggled on making some routine plays early on, and that kind of fed us some momentum.”
Columbus North has won six of its past eight games, with its only losses in that span coming against 4A then-No. 4 and now-No. 3 Noblesville and current No. 4 Cathedral.
“We’re starting to get the momentum going,” Hensley said. “We’re executing well. We’re getting hits. We’re starting to move runners around. The defense is playing well, so we’re playing really great ball right now.”
