Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

SOLON – In an anticipated matchup of two of the top pitchers in the WAMAC Clear Creek Amana coach Brent Henry wasn’t the only person expecting a pitchers’ duel in Friday’s district opener with Central DeWitt.

Henry got low scoring affair he anticipated just not the outcome he was hoping for.

Central DeWitt (25-15) scored a pair of first-inning runs on its way to a 3-0 win over Clear Creek Amana in a Class 3A district semifinal at Solon.

Senior Brad Gannon tossed a complete game two-hitter for Central DeWitt to outdo Clear Creek Amana ace Kobey Schlotman and send the top-seeded Sabers into the district final.

“When you get to districts you expect these close one, two or three run games,” Henry said. “They touched Kobey up in that first inning and that was enough for them.”

Clear Creek Amana couldn’t muster any offense against Gannon and was shutout for the first time since a June 19 loss to Independence, a span of 18 games.

The Clippers ended the season 18-20 with just their third loss in the last 14 games.

 “We gained a lot of confidence midway through the season with a nine-game win streak and we were feeling really good coming in,” Schlotman said. “It just didn’t go the way that we wanted it to.”

Central DeWitt got to Schlotman for three hits and two runs in the opening inning while snapping a personal seven-game winning streak for the Clipper ace.

The loss was the first since a season-opening setback to Washington for Schlotman who also had a string of five consecutive starts with two or fewer runs end on Friday.

Schlotman finished the season 7-2 with a 1.90 ERA and had allowed just four earned runs in his previous 33 2/3 innings before Friday’s finale.

“I was happy with the way I finished, I’m still a little upset about the way I threw at the beginning (of the game) but that’s baseball,” Schlotman said. “You have to keep your head up and move on.”

Cam Steffens singled with one-out in the first inning and McGwire Eden followed with an RBI double off the left center field fence, scoring Steffens to give the Sabers an early 1-0 lead.

“I missed my spot quite a bit and left it up quite a bit,” Schlotman said of the double by Eden. “I kind of gave that one to them but I just tried to stay focused and keep pitching well.”

Schlotman got Austin Weiss to ground out but Garrett Finley came up with a two-out RBI single up the middle that made it 2-0.

“We entered as a four seed but we were really expecting and anticipating to be able to put a pretty good run on,” Henry said. “It was really just one inning, that first inning kind of took a little bit of the wind out of our sails.”

Central DeWitt added a run in the third on a leadoff double by Steffens and a sac fly from Weiss but Gannon already had all the support he would need.

The senior right-hander retired the first 12 batters he faced before Tyler Hallett reached on an infield single to lead off the fifth.

“He was on point early in the game,” Henry said. “He was hitting his spots and keep us off balance. He was doing a heck of a job.”

Gannon struck out the side in the fifth following the single by Hallett and worked around a two-out walk to David Jensen and a single to Schlotman in the sixth.

With his performance on Friday, Gannon improved his season record to 2-4 while dropping his ERA to .38 in 37 innings.

“Once we got through the order one time and we started seeing him a second and third time we started putting the ball in play pretty hard and getting runners on,” Henry said. “He made some pitches when he needed to.”

Schlotman allowed three runs on eight hits in a six-inning complete game, striking out five and walking one.

“If you would have told me that we’d get a complete game, three-run effort out of Kobey I would take that any outing,” Henry said. “He was great for us all year.”

Clear Creek Amana  000  000  0  –  0  2  2

Central DeWitt          201  000  x  –  3  8  1 

W – Brad Gannon                   L – Kobey Schlotman

2B – CD: McGwire Eden, Cam Steffens