By RYAN WALKER
On a cold, brisk Friday night, the Knights warmed up with the sticks and on the rubber.
Norwell topped the struggling Angola Hornets (2-8) 11-1 in six innings with a strong offensive performance and Cayden Cassel’s best start in his young varsity career.
This was following a rough two-game stretch this week where the Knights fell in the Jay County game on Tuesday and 2-0 to Homestead the night before.
“I think the guys responded well tonight,” head coach Christian Bohata said. “The energy in the dugout, even in pregame when we’re taking batting practice, just the energy. There was a different feel tonight. I just stressed to the guys to keep that up all year, and we’ll be just fine.”
With a young roster, there have been some inconsistencies at the plate considering the team graduated six of the nine starters from last year. But Friday night showed a sign of an identity of manufacturing runs and some pop. Of the 11 runs scored, six of them were via the walk or sacrifice fly. Against Bluffton on Monday, the team even brought out the rare suicide squeeze card to score. And as talented of a program like Norwell is, there are hitters that can get it done as well. Cassel brought home two RBI on a base hit in the first inning, and Noah Turk’s single and Drew Graft’s double increased the lead to 5-0 by the end of the second.
Outside of those hits, the Knights came in without putting the ball on the ground, and that’s OK for Bohata.
“The biggest thing is putting the ball in play with two strikes,” Bohata said. “We’ve been stressing that ever since the first weekend, we notice that’s a major weakness we have … If we’re a small ball team, we’re a small ball team.”
The Hornets only came into the contest averaging three runs per game and with a .193 batting average. Cassel took full advantage of it, too.
In his six complete innings, Cassel allowed only three hits, an unearned run and nine strikeouts. He held Angola to a .142 batting average against and only allowed six base runners.
“He worked ahead in a lot of counts. We stress to our pitchers, the first two out of three pitches should be strikes and he did a lot of that tonight. It’s nice for him to get a complete game win. I think that’s a big confidence booster.”
Norwell will travel to Concordia next Monday at 5 p.m., April 22. This will be the first of a five-game week.
ryan@news-banner.com
