DANVILLE – The Thursday night Sagamore match-up between
North Montgomery and Danville couldn’t have been more different than their
Tuesday game.
Going from 22 hits Tuesday to 10 Thursday, both teams’
pitching and defense faced off with Danville committing the crucial errors.
North Montgomery took the win 2-0.
The Charger defense went errorless to back up Jordan Lewis
(WP) on the mound.
“We played errorless defense for the third time this week,”
Charger coach Matt Merica said. “If we get the pitching like we do from J-Lew
and play defense, we’re a tough team to beat.”
One similar aspect to Tuesday was that the Chargers got out
of another one-out bases loaded situation in the fourth inning. A grounder to
Caleb Donahue at second was flipped to shortstop Justin Clary cutting across
the base and fired to Matt Merica at first.
“That was a big pitch by J-Lew to get out of bases loaded
and the sophomore combination up the middle,” Merica commented. “That was a
beautiful double play and that’s why they are in the lineup. They are young but
they can play the game of baseball and we have all the confidence in the world
in them.”
Other than the fourth inning, Jordan Lewis had about as few
pitches as possible, letting only three baserunners on, one of which he picked
off at first.
“Both teams didn’t hit well but you can attribute that to
both pitchers,” Merica said. “They had command of all their pitches.”
The Charger offense got two breaks to cross the plate just
enough to pull a victory. The first run started with a Danville error followed
by a walk to move Mitch Merica over. Bryce Frederick drove one up the middle to
score Merica. The second run scored because of a Danville throwing error from
third to first which scored Riley Morehouse, who had a single to get on and was
driven over by Devon Zachary.
“We didn’t hit the ball well at all, you have to give credit
to their pitcher, he was mixing it up and we struggled,” Merica added.” We
manufactured two runs and took advantage of a couple of their mistakes.”
The Chargers (8-2, 4-0 SAC) stay tied at first in the
conference with Crawfordsville. They play two games Saturday, one at Western
Boone at 10 a.m. and the other at Harrison at 4 p.m.