Wilson baseball pitched its way to five wins in six days during the previous week, an astounding week by any measure. The Trojans beat both Franklin and Benson twice and Astoria once.
The Wilson pitching staff threw back-to-back no-hitters and a shutout to finish the week off. Senior Noah Keough pitched the first no hitter to Franklin on Tuesday, then Ben Haxby, a junior, threw another shutout to Benson on Thursday, following Wednesday’s rainout against Madison. Senior Cade Conklin ended the week on a high note with a 2-0 shutout against Astoria.
Tuesday’s game was surprising, with Wilson scoring only 11 runs against Franklin. Monday’s contest between the two teams was a 38-3 win for the Trojans.
Then Wilson played Benson, the only team in the Portland Interscholastic League (PIL) where a 10-run rule is implemented for league play. Wilson won 21-0 in five innings on Thursday, then 14-3 in another short game on Friday. According to Wilson coach Jeremy Shetler, they brought up several JV and JV2 players, especially pitchers, on Friday. Shetler decided to throw a new pitcher in each of the five innings.
Though Wilson dominated both Franklin and Benson, the games were not won just on the mound. Both teams were able to get their bat on the ball and put it in play, and Wilson pitcher Noah Keough accredits the defense behind him for helping keep Franklin at zero hits.
“It’s very rare you’re going to go out there and strike everybody out, so your defense plays a huge part. You’ve got to trust them,” Keough said.
No matter how poor the competition of the previous four games might have been, Wilson knew that Astoria was a good team. Shetler was well aware of Astoria coach Dave Gassor’s many previous successes. Gassor has coached at several high schools in Oregon, including Astoria twice, Madison and Lakeridge, and has won a state title at each school he’s been at.
“It doesn’t matter that they’re a 4A school, they still can play baseball….[Dave Gassor’s] team is always very well-coached,” said Shetler of Astoria.
Astoria and Wilson each had momentum going into Saturday’s game, though Astoria probably a little more than Wilson. Astoria had an eight-game win streak, and Wilson a four game win streak.
According to Shetler, they were only planning to throw Conklin, so when his change-up wasn’t working last Saturday, he had to rely on his other pitches.
“[Conklin] was bouncing his change-up in," Shetelr said. "But his fastball and his curveball were working well.”
Even though his change-up wasn’t working, Conklin only gave up two walks and three hits to the Fighting Fishermen. That low number of hits can partially be credited to Wilson senior centerfielder Alex Sabo, who made several great catches.
Shetler had only good words about his team’s performance: “....our kids went out and our defense played really well, Cade Conklin pitched very well...when he needed to make a pitch [with his other two pitches], he made it.”
