On a night where New London’s bats struggled to produce timely hits, Jake Hoier turned in a dominating pitching performance on the mound to help guide New London to a 1-0 win on the road over Seymour.
Hoier, who was perfect through 5 2/3 innings, lost his bid for a perfect game in the sixth on an error that took a tricky hop at first.
“Jake Hoier pitched one [heck] of a game today,” said New London head coach Jim Thorpe. “We left 12 guys on base and he pretty much carried us through that game. I would say that’s a great win for Jake. He definitely shouldered the load there and I haven’t seen too many too games like that on the mound, so that was great.”
Hoier was able to keep the Seymour hitters off balance all night long, ultimately surrendering two hits while striking out four and without issuing a walk.
“I wasn’t feeling very good in warm-ups,” Hoier admitted after the game. “My arm was sore, but my catcher Dylan Moeller just told me to go up there and try to throw it across the plate. I told coach Jim I’d go out there and try to throw strikes and that’s just what I did.”
Although he’s not the type of pitcher to blow hitters away with a blistering fastball, Hoier excelled at mixing his pitches and consistently throwing his breaking balls for strikes.
“I was just going out there, continuing to throw strikes, pound the zone, work my stuff,” Hoier said. “I started them with fastballs, come back with sliders, just tried to keep it tough on hitters the whole time.”
He was efficient with his pitches also, finishing the complete-game shutout with a total of 84.
The game was scoreless heading into the seventh, but that’s when the Clippers were able to string together a two-out rally. Ethan Wood started with a walk, while Grant Oberstadt followed with an infield single. On a full count, Dylan Moeller came through with a base-hit RBI to right field.
Seymour’s Sam Blank broke up the no-hitter with a two-out double in the seventh, but Hoier responded by getting Ryan Peterson to ground out to end the game.
New London’s win moves the team to 3-0 in league play to start the legion year.
“This is a great start,” said coach Thorpe. “This is a nice win, especially these close wins like this. It really shows some guts that we can stick with a team and not freak out and have the wheels fall off on us. When we can have a pitcher carry us through a game, it’s always good, especially a league game like this.”
Despite cooling off a little tonight, Thorpe says it’s been the team’s hitting that’s powered them to the quick start.
“Our bats have been hot,” he said. “We put up 20 hits on Sunday against Menasha and we’ve been scoring some runs. It’s nice to see a pitcher do this when we’re having our bats cool off.”
Will Wohlt was the only Clipper batter to finish with multiple hits, going 2-for-4 with a pair of singles. They finished with eight hits as a team.