Harness’ no-hitter helps Caston avenge earlier loss, advance to sectional semis

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

Baseball

Caston 10, West Central 0 (5 innings, Thursday): Carson Harness pitched a no-hitter with five strikeouts as the Caston baseball team handled West Central in a Class 1A, Sectional 50 quarterfinal at Caston Thursday.

Caston broke a scoreless tie with a nine-run fourth.

The inning included two West Central errors. The first error came on a Harness sacrifice bunt and allowed two runs to score. Another error in center field on Parker Zimpleman’s liner brought in Harness.

The inning also featured six walks, including three straight bases-loaded walks to Logan Mollenkopf, Eli Holloway and Gavin Mollenkopf that bumped a 3-0 lead to 6-0. Noah Herd followed with a two-run single to make it 8-0, and Zimpleman added an RBI single to make it 9-0.

Gavin Mollenkopf’s walk-off RBI walk in the fifth ended it.

Holloway and McGrew also had singles.

The teams combined for 16 walks and a hit batter.

Harness retired the first four batters, but West Central loaded the bases on a hit batter, an error and a walk, but Harness got Devon Foust to ground into a forceout at the plate and struck out Maddox Gutwein to escape the jam.

West Central had runners at first and third with one out in the third, but Harness struck out Zane Wall and got Addison Huber on a fly to right to retire the side.

Harness also got Connor Huber to ground into a forceout to end the fourth after the Trojans had put two on base.

Caston avenged a 15-14 loss in eight innings to West Central in Francesville April 28 in their regular season meeting.

Caston (19-7) will face South Newton at approximately 1:30 p.m. Saturday in the semifinals. South Newton snapped a 27-game losing streak dating back to last season with a 15-3 win in five innings over North White in Thursday’s other quarterfinal.

South Newton had lost twice this season to North White by a combined score of 27-11.

Pioneer will face Tri-County in the first quarterfinal at 11 a.m.

Caston 10, West Central 0 (5 innings)

West Central 000 00 – 0 0 2

Caston 000 91 – 10 4 3

WP – Carson Harness (5 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 5 BB, 1 HBP, 5 K)

LP – Teagan Holle (3 ⅓ IP, 2 H, 8 R, 0 ER, 6 BB, 7 K)

XBH – (none)