2012 - Week-10, Top-10

High School Baseball Teams in

Northwest Indiana

A USA-365.com Special Report by Mark Smith

5-30-2012

ST. JOHN (05-25-2012) Due to the painful "hurry-up" IHSAA playoff format, local teams crushed in a lot of unscheduled games in the final days of the regular season and then raced through the sectional on a clumsily-scheduled Memorial Day weekend.

With the state tournament beginning on Wednesday, May 22, teams were playing games the night of Tuesday, May 21. It's time for baseball coaches state wide to get together and end this nonsense. There is no REAL reason the baseball state tournament cannot continue until the final week of June. With a mindless desire to end the school year in early June (I'm assuming so ADs can have time off in June), spring sports continued to be handcuffed and forced into bizarre school night scheduling.

The trade-off for having the state finals on June 16 is to play state tourney openers on a Wednesday and Sectional Championship games on a Monday night. Coaches seem uncaring or unwilling to speak up about how their sport is butchered so everybody can go on vacation the final two weeks in June.

You folks in LaPorte already know this, but when the Slicers, who were 30-5 in 2000 (the good old days) won the 4A state baseball championship game 10-6 over Evansville Harrison, the date of the game was Saturday, June 24. The 1998 state championship IHSAA Baseball games were held on June 26 and 27. The 1999 games were held on June 25 and 26.

An arbitrary decision was made by, I assume, the IHSAA to end ALL spring sports in the middle of June, forcing ALL sports to cheapen and shorten their seasons. The collateral damage here is that the boys track regionals and baseball state tournament quarterfinals are held on the same week night at the same time.

Softball was shortened and compressed as well so the girls regional track meet, the girls regional tennis semifinals and the girls softball sectional quarterfinals are held on the same date at the same time every year now.

Most coaches are just concerned with 1.) Winning games and 2.) Keeping their jobs. The health of the sport itself is a distant third. They don't seem to be too upset by the "hurry-up" format or they feel impotent to change it.

But if there was one thing I could do to improve high school sports, it would be to return the baseball season to its original length. Track and tennis would end with state championship action the week of the baseball sectional. Softball would also return to its four-week format beginning one week prior to the baseball tournament so sectional championship baseball could be played Friday night with softball regional playoffs the next day. Only a few teams would still be playing by mid-June. ADs get paid until the end of June anyway. Kids graduate in early June anyway.

It's just bad the way it is now.

The baseball regular season ended with seven ranked teams in Northwest Indiana. In Class 1A, Morgan Township (20-5) is ranked fourth and Washington Township (20-9) is seventh.
In 2A, Wheeler (2-17) finished fifth in the coaches poll. In Class 3A, Andrean (25-4) ends with the No. 2 ranking while in 4A, Lake Central (25-1) is No. 1 and Crown Point (26-4) is No. 4. Portage (23-6) is rated 13th to end the year.

The top teams were whittled down to eight NW Indiana survivors by the time the Memorial Day sun went down.

1. (4A) LAKE CENTRAL (28-1)
26-5 (2011), 20-6 (2010), 27-5 (2009), 22-9-2 (2008)

ST. JOHN: LC swamped Munster, Lowell and Highland to win 4A Sectional 1. They never trailed. No problems. Lake Central swept past everyone down the stretch, including a 7-1 win over Cathedral in Indianapolis. Jimmy McNamara (7-1) struck out 13 in a 6-1 win at LaPorte on May 17. Here comes Elkhart Central, the team that eliminated LC in 2011 in the LaPorte Regional. The only problem for LC is how they react if they fall behind. I can't find a time when LC trailed by more than one run all season and I can almost guarantee they will be behind sometime in the post-season.

MERRILLVILLE: The Niners lost a couple of games in the final two weeks, but they closed with an 11-2 victory over St. Rita (22-12), a Chicago Catholic League power. But then they rolled over Rensselaer 9-3 and KV 7-0 to win the KV Sectional. Junior Zach Ryan (9-2) pitched a one-hitter against KV. Sophomore Matt DeSomer, who has not pitched much this season, made a four-inning start in the win over St. Rita and shortstop Mike Brosseau was 3-for-3 at the top of a 13-hit attack. Andrean has the tradition and the expectation of playing in the state finals. But they have Griffith and Marian standing in the way at the Plymouth Regional, the graveyard for past 59er teams. Marian has eliminated Andrean in basketball and baseball in the last two playoffs.

3. (4A) Crown Point (27-5)
21-12 (2011), 27-5 (2010), 30-3 (2009), 29-6-2 (2008), 29-3 (2007)

CROWN POINT: CP played poorly in both games at the Merrillville sectional, surviving Michigan City 7-3 and losing to Valparaiso 7-6 in nine innings. Odd but true. Crown Point was 7-0 and then 7-2. They were 14-2 and then 14-4. The Bulldogs then closed the season with 12 wins in a row even though center fielder Kevin Brunski missed the last 13 games and top returning pitcher Ronnie Plesac didn't throw a pitch all season. But they were not good in the post-season. Not at all.

CP has more returning in 2013 than any other team in NW Indiana. Both Zac and Ron Plesac should be able to pitch and catcher Bobby Morgan returns. David Kepshire and Markus Kessler return for senior right-handers and 2012 freshman Noah Burkholder should come back very strong. It's hard to be disappointed about a 27-5 season where your No. 1 pitcher missed the entire season and your center fielder missed the last dozen games.

PORTAGE: The Indians had a spectacular season, especially when you take away the two losses to No. 1 Lake Central. But here was another post-season disappointment. The Indians lost 18-8 to Valparaiso in the 4A Sectional 2 championship game and I would not have predicted a blowout loss. The Indians rolled over Merrillville 14-3 and LaPorte 11-2, but they were shelled against Valparaiso. Portage graduates third baseman Gabe Acevedo (.454, 5 HRs, 28 RBIs) and catcher Zach Simmons (.451, 22 RBIs) so they won't have the offense in 2013 that they had this spring.

5. (4A) Valparaiso (20-11)
13-12 (2011), 19-9 (2010), 14-13 (2009), 13-15 (2008)

VALPARAISO: The Vikings took advantage of a warm weather weekend and piled up runs on Chesterton 9-3, Crown Point 7-6 and Portage 16-6. Pitchers Devin Bafia got the win in all three sectional games, something I have never seen before. Bafia threw 128 pitches against Chesterton and pitched three more innings two days later in the extra inning win over CP. Then Bafia pitched the final two innings of the runaway against Portage to win a six-inning game. John Olejniczak had six RBIs in 95-degree heat against Portage. Joe Gallinatti hit a grand slam against Chesterton. It was Valpo's time. The regional road is rough. Penn and Elkhart Central. But if Bafia can pitch in both games, who knows?

HAMMOND: Noll's losses are to Crown Point, Lake Central, Chesterton, Michigan City and Wheeler so it's no surprise that they won 2A Sectional 33. But the 5-4 win over 2A No. 5 Wheeler (21-7) on a ninth-inning hit by Matt Sandoval put Noll into the finals. The Warriors won the Greater South Shore Conference (GSSC) title and smoked out Whiting 5-1 to win the sectional championship. Most of the top 10-to-15 Class 2A teams (most 2A teams period) are in the southern half of the state. And the regional is in Whiting? And they get to play Hebron (18-8)? If Noll can beat Fort Wayne clone Bishop Luers (21-7), they're in the semistate.

HOBART: Knocked out quickly at the 4A Merrillville Sectional in an 11-0 loss to LaPorte, the Brickies are a "year away." Hobart won its last four of the regular season, including a 10-5 home win over Andrean. The Brickies topped Morton 11-2, and Wheeler 8-1 in the final days. Sophomore Brandon Murray struck out nine against Morton. Murray and catcher Nick Bokun are sophomores so there's time. The 11-0 loss will sting a bit. But Hobart will be back.

HAMMOND: It's hard to rate a 2A team over Munster, although that point is irrelevant as Munster could not get past Lake Central in the 4A Sectional quarterfinals, a 7-0 loss. The Mustangs have lost to Crown Point (27-5), 1-0 and 7-0 to Lake Central (28-1) and Jimmy McNamara (9-1), 11-8 to Valpo (21-11), and 4-2 to Hobart (22-8) as well as 12-0 to Andrean (28-4) and Portage (25-1). They are used to better, but I didn't think Munster had a bad season. But I can't tell you much about 2013. The Mustangs graduated 11 seniors in June.

MORGAN TOWNSHIP: Morgan beat LaCrosse 12-5 and 1A No. 9 Washington Township (22-10) to win the WT sectional. Jake Gourley was 3-for-4 with a homer and five RBIs against LaCrosse. Ryan Klikus struck out 11. Washington (22-10) had defeated Morgan 2-1 in the Porter County Conference (PCC) championship game. I'm not big on honorary rankings but this is Morgan's best team in school history with a .358 batting average and four regulars hitting over .350 led by Ryan Klikus (38-86 .442), Matt Polito (36-90, .379), Austin Porter (36-95, .379) and Mark Ehrstein (35-71, .352). Morgan will be favored over South Central in the Whiting Regional next Saturday, but Blackhawk Christian (20-6-1) waits in the championship game.

10. (3A) Hanover Central (19-10)
22-6 (2011), 23-10 (2010), 11-16 (2009), 15-10 (2008)

CEDAR LAKE: Hanover lost a 4-0 lead and lost 5-4 to Kankakee Valley in the semifinals of 3A Sectional 18. It's unlikely they would have defeated Andrean (28-4) later that day, but I would have liked to see them get the chance. HC obviously is 41-17 over the past two years and the future is bright with three freshmen playing significant roles. This is clearly a strength-of-schedule selection as the HC losses are to KV (17-14), Wheeler (21-7), Whiting (18-10), Washington Township (22-4), Portage (26-8), Valparaiso (21-10), Crown Point (27-5) and Lake Central (28-1). HC doesn't have to get much better to win 20 in 2013, but they have to get a LOT BETTER to defeat Andrean in sectional play.