LINDEN – Ryan Cole usually receives kudos from North Montgomery baseball coach Matt Voorhees for his scientific approach to analyzing the Charger hitters.
Wednesday evening the assistant coach was in another role – calling pitches for his son, sophomore Cade Cole.
“He’s called pitches for me since I was six years old,” the younger Cole said.
It worked out pretty well on a windy evening at Charger Field as Cade Cole tossed a perfect game in a 10-0, six inning win over Danville.
“We know each other pretty well, so it’s great having him right there.”
Cole only needed 55 of those pitches called by his dad.
“I thought I had good command of my fastball and curveball. If I got the hitters 0-2 or 1-2, I could throw my slider.”
Confidence was there even before taking the field.
“I felt like I was locked in from the start,” Cole added. “Even in the bullpen I had good command of my pitches.”
Cole dominated from the start and set all 18 hitters he faced down, including four strike outs. Also, he only threw one first pitch ball and was behind on the count to one other Warrior batter. Cole recovered to strike out Chris DiBennedetto.
“Getting ahead in the count is obviously such a big thing,” Cole said as he was drenched by his teammates with the water cooler dump. “But I also have to thank my defense and my catcher. (Danville) put a lot of balls in play.”
“Cade throwing 55 pitches, obviously that’s really efficient,” Voorhees said. “He was just really effective with his pitches too. Even 0-2 he was whittling, getting guys to chase the off speed stuff in the dirt or up high. He did a great job spotting up everything he threw tonight.”
Cole topped the night by driving in the 10th and final run with a bases loaded sacrifice fly in the sixth.
According to North athletic director Matt Merica, that could be the first perfect game in school history. It came as a full team effort.
“More importantly it’s great to be a pitcher and have confidence in the guys behind you,” Voorhees said. “The outfield made great plays on full sprint and the infield had several bang-bang plays.”
North’s (7-3, 4-0 Sagamore Conference) monster inning offensively was a seven run burst in the fourth. Corbin Meadows and Dylan Braun had back to back two RBI hits with Meadows’ hit being a double. Gage Galloway had two hits in the inning as 11 hitters took swings. That was the last inning for Danville (2-5, 0-4) starter Kole Miller.
North got on the board in the first inning thanks to an unearned run. Brookes Walters scored after reaching on a fielder’s choice and an error. A passed ball and second error allowed him to touch the plate. The Chargers added a single run in the fourth, an RBI double by designated hitter Noah Hopkins.
“At the plate we did a great job with a two strike approach,” Voorhees said. “Guys were battling, we were a lot more patient. We talked about hitting our pitch early and not chasing theirs.”
Eight of the nine starters had at least one hit and eight scored at least one run.
“I always commend Coach Cole,” Voorhees said. “All the time and effort he puts into it, breaks down our hitters’ swings and constantly manages our lineup and what’s going to be the best run production for us. The last two nights we’ve been able to do that with two 10-0 games.”
The perfect game by Cole adds to the key pitching the Chargers have put on the mound.
“Cade had been good already. He had like a 0.54 ERA. Coach (Joe) Swick does a great job with out pitchers. One of our pitchers, Roman Utterback, has had a tender arm after Covington. To get two complete games the last two nights is big.”
The Chargers have a busy weekend with a couple home games. Friday evening Harrison is at Charger Field followed by a Saturday morning Sagamore Conference matchup against rival Southmont.
“To be able to pick up a sweep against a Sagamore opponent is pretty big. It doesn’t matter which opponent they throw at you. Every day everyone is capable.”
