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Springfield baseball team back in a familiar position
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Springfield’s Cody Pitzo and his Tigers teammates will make their fourth trip in five seasons to the Division III regional semifinal today — this time against the Cuyahoga Heights Redskins at The PIpeyard in Lorain.
By Brandon Judeh
NEW MIDDLETOWN
For most area teams the long baseball season has come to an end, but for the Springfield Tigers, it is just getting interesting.
The Tigers (22-5) take on Cuyahoga Heights (18-4) today at The Pipe Yard in Lorain in the Division IV regional semifinals.
It’s nothing new for the Tigers. This is their fourth trip in five seasons, as they go for their third trip to the state semifinals in the last four years.
Springfield coach Matt Weymer said his team is confident heading into the matchup against the Redskins.
“A lot of the confidence has to do with the rich tradition of the baseball program we have here,” said Weymer.
“Every group of kids we get commits to this program and works hard, from freshmen all the way up to the seniors.”
Cuyahoga Heights may be a handful for starting pitcher Nick Russell, who went 9-0 with an ERA of 0.38 — he allowed three earnes runs in 55 innings. He struck out 58 batters.
The Redskins have won 12 consecutive games.
“There’s not a ton of advanced scouting in high school baseball, so not much is known about this team, but all of us are excited to be back in the regionals and I am confident in our guys and their experience,” said Weymer.
Springfield cruised past Matthews, Western Reserve and JFK by a combined score of 27-3 in previous tournament games. Weymer credits that to his team’s continued improvement.
“We had some holes to fill defensively coming into the season and we moved some guys around, but each week I continue to see an improvement in our defense and they have come up big for us in the playoffs,” Weymer said. “We are a united team.”
Weymer also said coming into the season he told Russell, who was coming off of a 10-win season, if he could repeat his performance from last year, his team would be fine.
Sure enough Russell, whose confident, laid back demeanor is a perfect example of how the Tigers play, came through when needed.
The Tigers offense can beat you in many ways: By applying pressure on the basepaths (89 percent of bases successfully stolen), patient hitting and getting on base by any means.
“We had a lot of younger guys step up this year, our leadoff hitter [Ryan Kohler] is a freshman and is hitting over .300, which is huge for a freshman,” added Weymer. “Joe Ohlin has stepped up for us both offensively and as our number two starter and our shortstop Cody Pitzo is a good hitter, he never gets himself out.”
Springfield has four seniors and they would like to go out on top as state champions. Perhaps more importantly, Weymer said, is all of them are great kids off the diamond.