Anything but routine (05/08/06)

MINSTER, Ohio — The words were beaten into their heads.

Constantly coach Aaron Vaughn told his players the same thing over and over again. If they simply made the plays which were routine, they could accomplish something that was anything but.

Fort Recovery came through Saturday, making all the routine plays and several great ones to win its first baseball sectional title since 2001 with a 3-2 victory over the host Minster Wildcats.

“Baseball’s a funny game,” said Minster coach Mike Wyss. “On any given day something can happen — it may be a good thing, it may be a bad thing. Today it’s not a good thing for us. It’s a great thing for Fort Recovery.”

“I tell them, routine plays, if you make those, you give your chance to win the game if you throw strikes, which Kevin (Schoenherr) did all day,” Vaughn said. “And then the spectacular plays will come, and those did.

“We got ahead early and just never looked back. It was just a great team effort.”

Fort Recovery (11-9) got a little help from the Wildcats in the second inning and never gave up the lead.

Curt Heitkamp got on base on a one-out error by shortstop Aaron Heitbrink, and Tony Diller followed with a walk. With two on and one out, the bottom of the lineup came through.

Steve Trobridge, who homered in the Indians’ 15-5 sectional win over Waynesfield-Goshen April 29, ripped an RBI single to left field. No. 9 hitter Toby Metzger followed with a sacrifice fly to center to bring Diller home for a 2-0 lead.

The other Tribe run came on perfect execution in the third inning after Schoenherr drew a one-out walk.

Troy Metzger worked the count to 1-and-2, and Vaughn saw his chance.

Believing Metzger would see a fastball, he sent Schoenherr in motion on a hit-and-run. The risk paid off in a big way as Metzger clobbered a fastball to center field and strolled to third base with a stand-up, RBI triple.

“Coach had the hit-and-run going on and it was a fastball, so I just swung and it hit the right spot on the bat and went to the fence,” said Metzger. “It was pretty nice.”

Fort Recovery didn’t get another hit in the game, but Metzger’s proved to be enough.

“Troy’s a fastball hitter,” said Vaughn. “He got a 2-1 count and (Minster pitcher Bob Inskeep) had to throw him a fastball ... to make sure he threw a strike. It just happened to be a perfect pitch for Troy. Troy just went the other way, went with it, took what they gave him and got a huge hit for us.”

“When you get ahead early ... it puts so much pressure on the other team. ... When you’re ahead you can do a lot more things on the base paths, being aggressive.”

The Indians’ last sectional championship victory also came versus Minster when Brad Bretz hit a three-run, walk-off home run against the Wildcats at St. Henry in 2001. That team made it to the district finals before dropping out of the state tournament.

The 2006 Fort Recovery squad will move on to play the New Bremen Cardinals in district semifinal action at Minster Monday, May 15, at 5 p.m. New Bremen, which the Indians defeated 4-1 Friday, won their sectional title with a 5-2 upset of No. 2 seed Marion Local at Minster Saturday.

With Schoenherr on the hill the Indians team played error-free baseball to win their sectional crown, making a variety of excellent defensive plays as Minster missed on several scoring chances.

“I can’t say enough about Kevin,” said Vaughn of his starter. “He had an 0.00 ERA, so we wanted to give him a chance to be out there because he hadn’t given up any earned runs. He really deserves the title of ‘ace’ today.

“Today Kevin kept the ball low, changed speeds and we made every play. That was the difference.”

The Wildcats (14-6) had runners on first and second with one out in the first inning and with two outs in the third, but Schoenherr induced ground-ball outs to Chris Galdeen at second base to end both frames. Center fielder Brad Fortkamp came up with a great diving catch in the second inning.

Jake Luttmer led off the fourth inning with a single and stole second base, but Minster could not get him around. Schoenherr retired the next three batters in a row, then added one-two-three frames in the fifth and sixth as he sat down nine straight. He struck out two batters in the fifth, and left fielder Bobby Rammel made catches — two diving — for all three outs in the sixth.

The Wildcats finally got on the board in the seventh inning as their first three batters reached base. They scored twice, the second run coming on a two-out single to center by leadoff hitter Brian Mueller.

Rammel came in to pitch in relief of Schoenherr, and Mueller stole second and third bases. But Rammel wouldn’t let him score the tying run, getting a bouncer back to the mound from Aaron Heitkbrink and tossing to Schoenherr at first to complete the victory.

“We didn’t hit the ball well,” said Minster coach Mike Wyss. “I’m sure Schoenherr is a little bit responsible for that. It’s not an easy thing to take.

“In the last week or so we’ve been getting that two-out hit. Today we did not. We created some things in the last inning, but its tough to make that all happen in one inning.”[[In-content Ad]]