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The Falcons beat Blooming Prairie 2-1 in the opening round of the Section 1A tournament Saturday at Mayo Field. Nihart led off the bottom of the first inning with a solo home run, drove in W-K’s go-ahead run in the third and took a no-hitter into the sixth.
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Jaron Nihard, a senior from Wabasha-Kellogg High School, throws a pitch against Blooming Prairie, Minn. Saturday at Mayo Field in Rochester, Minn. (Photo by Paul Solberg/Winona Daily News) |
Top-seeded W-K (17-4) will take on No. 2 Chatfield (18-7), a 7-3 winner over Southland, at 7:30 p.m. Monday at Mayo Field. The winner will be one win from advancing to the eight-team Class A state tournament beginning June 14 in Chaska, Minn.
W-K and Chatfield split a pair of games this year, each team winning by a score of 8-5.
Nihart took control of the game early, striking out seven of the first eight batters he faced. In between, he put W-K on the board, leading off the bottom of the first with a tape-measure solo home run over a Perkins Restaurant advertisement 390 feet from home plate in straightaway center field.
Nihart drove in Tyler Nelson with a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the third to put W-K up 2-0, but the real drama came with each out Nihart recorded on the mound.
W-K coach Chris Gove said he didn’t realize his senior ace was throwing a no-hitter until the fifth inning. By then, Nihart had thoroughly dominated the Awesome Blossoms’ (16-7) lineup nearly twice over.
“In the first inning he was striking people out and I looked at my assistant and I said, ‘I wish he would get some ground balls to our infielders. I don’t want my third baseman or short stop to get their first ground ball on a key play in the fifth or sixth inning,’” Gove said. “And sure enough, that’s when their first ground ball was. That’s tough, but the guys stepped up when they had to. It was good to see.”
Blooming Prairie senior Marcus Zellmer, the No. 9 hitter, broke up Nihart’s no-hit bid in the top of the sixth on an infield single up the middle. Zellmer scored on an error two batters later for the Awesome Blossoms’ only run.
“Nobody said a word,” Gove said. “In the dugout, anything. Nobody said a word. Everybody’s main focus was winning the game and that was Jarod’s, too. He just wants to win.”
Nihart finished with 13 strikeouts, three walks, and one hit batsman in picking up the complete-game win. This, after a 4-for-5 performance in the 1A East Sub-section championship and a complete-game shutout the game before that.
Nelson went 2-for-3 with a double and a run scored. W-K center fielder Craig Loechler went 1-for-2 and came up with a diving catch on a well-hit ball to left-center in the top of the fourth, at the time preserving Nihart’s no-hitter.
“I can see a difference,” Gove said. “We were here last year and you can see the difference with Trevor (Glomski) at first, and Kyler (Stiner) at second and Kyle (Sill) behind the plate, how much more confident they are.”
