PREP BASEBALL: Walled Lake Northern silences Troy bats
BY JAKE LOURIM
STUDENT CORRESPONDENT
TROY — The weather warmed up for the Troy baseball team Thursday. The Colts’ bats did not.
The Troy bats were silenced in a 6-1, non-league baseball loss to visiting Walled Lake Northern in which the colts managed only three hits in the first five innings.
“We were very flat today,” Troy coach Jim Ellis said. “I can’t point at anything specific. I don’t think our effort was bad, we just didn’t hit the ball. We hit the ball right at people. We just didn’t get that accelerated step to get back in the game.”
Senior Matt Oppenlander agreed.
“Just one of those games,” he said. “We didn’t do anything badly, we just didn’t have our best game. (We) didn’t show up really, (our) bats were flat.”
The Colts couldn’t figure out the Knights’ starter, and then they left four on base in the last two innings after Northern went to the bullpen.
After four innings, the pitcher still had only faced the minimum number of hitters, though he was helped out by two double plays and a runner caught stealing.
Troy (3-2) only struck out three times, but hit the ball hard right at the opposing defense.
“You play baseball 30, 40 games, you’re going to have a game like this where nothing clicks for you,” Ellis said. “They took advantage of the breaks we gave them, and we didn’t give ourselves a chance to get some advantages. We just didn’t get it done today.”
Senior starting pitcher Derek Verbruggen and junior reliever Justin Losey each gave up three runs, but only one each was earned.
Northern squeezed out a run in the first on a walk, stolen base, sacrifice, and passed ball.
The Knights brought home a dropped third strike in the second inning and scored again on a double and a Verbruggen error in the third.
Losey left the bases loaded in the fourth, but Northern broke it open with a three-run fifth. Troy started to pound out some baserunners in the following innings, but it wasn’t nearly enough.
“I didn’t feel we had any opportunities to get anything going today,” Ellis said. “The one good point that can come out of this is that we have a big game tomorrow. That’s the best part about baseball is that you get an opportunity the next day to come out and turn it around.”
Senior Matt Oppenlander pitched two strong innings to finish it off, but the three combined to throw 120 pitches and only 63 strikes with seven walks.
“I saw what I would expect to see from guys on their first outing of the year,” said Ellis, who has seen two pitchers make their varsity debuts, and Oppenlander pitch for the first time in two years, so far this week. “I’d like to see us get ahead of hitters more; we were pitching in some bad counts.”
The teams actually tied in hits, but Northern moved them along and knocked them in.
Troy will have to hope it doesn’t have another one of those days against Athens today. The Colts finish the week with a doubleheader tomorrow against Rochester. They’ve already used six pitchers so far this week.
“We definitely need to get the bats going again,” Oppenlander said. “We need to get some hits, we need to get some baserunners, and we need to get them into scoring position so we can manufacture some runs.”
Senior Luke McCloskey and junior Kevin Simono each went 2-for-3 Thursday in their respective first starts of the season.
BOX SCORE
WALLED LAKE NORTHERN 6, TROY 1
W – Davis (WLN) – 5 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, 63 NP
L – Verbruggen (Troy) – 3 IP, 3 H, 3 R (1 ER), 2 BB, 4 K, 59 NP
WLN 111 0300 – 6 7 1
TRY 000 0001 – 1 7 3
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