Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

Bring up Izaya Ono-Fullard as one of the top hitters in the state to anyone that follows prep baseball and you won’t get an argument.

The West High senior third baseman certainly has the resume to back up the claim of one of the best in Iowa.

Ono-Fullard has swatted a state-best 10 home runs, ranks second in Class 4A in RBI and is a career .408 hitter.

To fully understand just how good Ono-Fullard has been during his three seasons as a starter at West High look no further than last season.

By his own account Ono-Fullard struggled last summer as a junior. The expectations following a strong debut season and the pressure of the recruiting process weighed on him.

“My sophomore year went really well and going into my junior year I had a lot of expectations and I was putting too much pressure on myself,” Ono-Fullard said. “I wanted to do too much and had a frustrating season.”

The results from that frustrating season for Ono-Fullard?

37 runs and 30 RBI with an on-base percentage, slugging percentage, batting average slash of .472/.469/.354.

Those are career-best numbers for a good prep hitter. For Ono-Fullard it was a rare dip in production for one of the state’s most productive hitters.

“His sophomore year he was really good and last year was a little down, he hit into some tough luck last year,” West High coach Charlie Stumpff said. “This year he has gotten it all over again.”

In his first season of varsity action Ono-Fullard hit .441 with 20 extra-base hits and 40 RBI.

After the disappointing junior season Ono-Fullard has been at his best in his final season at West High.

He ended his recruiting when he committed to Kirkwood in the spring.

Free of that pressure that weighed heavy on his shoulders last season Ono-Fullard has unloaded on opposing pitchers this season.

He entered the Class 4A state tournament hitting .425 with 58 RBI and a state-leading 10 home runs.

“Last year, I was getting recruited and I put pressure on myself,” Ono-Fullard said. “This year I came in I committed which relieved a lot of pressure off my back and this year I just wanted to play and have fun and I really want to win a state championship my senior year.”
Ono-Fullard has always been a high average, low strikeout hitter.

In better than 409 career at bats he has struck out just 28 times and never more than 10 times in a season.

This season Ono-Fullard has kept that high contact rate while increasing his power.

Nearly half of his 57 hits have gone for extra bases with 15 doubles to go with his 10 home runs.

“I have a different approach this year,” Ono-Fullard said. “I’ve always been a guy who doesn’t like to strike out, I like to get on base a lot but this year I knew that I should have more RBI and hit more home runs so I’m trying to be aggressive in the count.”

Ono-Fullard has also scored a career-high 48 runs which leads West High and his 58 RBI are 18 more than his previous career best.

“I really worked on being more assertive with my swing early in the count,” Ono-Fullard said. “I’ve always felt good about protecting and hitting the breaking ball. I’ve always been a guy who hit to the other side of the field but I’ve been trying to pull the ball more and hit with more power.”

Part of what makes Ono-Fullard one of the state’s best hitters is his consistency.

He has a hit in 33 of 39 games this season and had a 14-game hitting streak during the season.

Ono-Fullard has 20 multi-hit games and six games with three or more hits.

“In baseball you are going to fail more than you succeed so just feeling good and seeing the ball well is big,” Ono-Fullard said. “If you have a good approach and good at bats the hits are going to fall.”

Ono-Fullard helped West High return to the state tournament for the fourth straight season going 3-for-5 with two home runs and seven RBI in two postseason wins.

Third-ranked West High (31-8) is after its first state title after three consecutive runner-up finishes.

“We’ve been runners-up three years, that’s really tough,” Ono-Fullard said. “We really want to get one for coach Stumpff. We really want to get one especially with this group of seniors it would be really special.”