Baseball: Greyhounds end drought, rally back against Raiders

By RICHARD TORRES

For The Reporter

CARMEL – The Carmel Greyhounds finally had enough.

Winless in five straight contests prior to Wednesday night, the Class 4A eighth-ranked Greyhounds first showcased their appreciation for teachers during pregame, and then they entertained their faithful Hartman Field home crowd with a 5-2 comeback victory.

Visiting Harrison (11-5-1) came in hot, winning seven straight, but the Greyhounds’ (10-6) timely hitting and pitching quartet of Cole Caldwell, Parker Heaney, Nathan Koebcke and Gabe Mathison proved unwavering.

Baylor recruit Hunter Snow crushed a solo home run in the bottom of the first on a 3-0 count to put Carmel up 1-0 before the Raiders charged back to take a 2-1 lead in the top of the third behind a fielding error and four consecutive two-out singles.

Despite the momentary setback, the Greyhounds regrouped with one-run bottom of the fourth and a three-run fifth, while the pitching staff combined for five strikeouts, three walks, eight hits surrendered and eight baserunners left stranded.

“We’ve been in a little bit of a funk, but it’s not because we’re not a good team. It’s not because we’re not capable. We let a few games go there where we just, quite frankly, were not taking outs. That’s sometimes the most controllable thing in this game. To take the outs, and we didn’t. We haven’t been, even last night we gave the game away by not taking outs,” Carmel head coach Ty Neal said. “But when we pitch to contact and take the outs, we’re just as good as any team in the state of Indiana.”

On Tuesday, the Greyhounds lost 6-4 to county rival Fishers on the road after dropping a 5-1 decision to 3A No. 2 Guerin Catholic at home on Thursday. A pair of losses to Trinity (Kentucky) and at Avon previously put Carmel in a tough spot.

“It was important offensively to start off with a bang, but we’ve been on a five-game losing streak, so it was good to give the boys some energy,” Snow said. “It was a 3-0 count, and I was expecting fastball, and I got it. I stayed on top of it.”

Snow (2-for-3, two runs) blasted Harrison starter Jeremy Lowrey’s offering over the right-field fence, marking his fourth longball of the season. Snow, who has been under the watchful eye of several MLB scouts in recent weeks, is hitting .348 with 19 RBI.

“We play a tough schedule, and you lose those close games, but even Harrison is a good squad, so it’s good to get those wins after a little bit of a drought,” Snow said. “We want to keep it rolling. Keep our guys up and continue to throw strikes and continue to have good at-bats.”

The Greyhounds strung together quality plate appearances in the bottom of the fourth to tie the game 2-2 after Heaney (2-for-2) led off the frame with a single followed by a Nash Skelton single down the first-base line.

Carmel loaded the bases and deadlocked the score with a passed ball before Lowrey escaped the jam.

Caldwell scattered seven hits with one walk issued and three strikeouts before being relieved in the top of the fifth. Heaney picked up right where Caldwell left off, closing the top half of the frame with a runner stranded on third base.

“When we take outs, we are a really good team,” Neal said. “It’s a good ball club for sure, and the guys, they’re competitors. I think we were all kind of looking at each other, and we were kind of sick of this little funk we’re in. We talked about it last night. Nobody is going to hand us anything and going back to that schedule, we want to play the most competitive schedule we can play.”

The Greyhounds broke the game open in the bottom of the fifth beginning with a leadoff full-count single by Snow after he worked back from being down 0-2.

Mathison reached base with a walk before Snow advanced and later scored on a pair of passed balls. An RBI single by Skelton (2-for-3) scored Mathison. An RBI single by Silas Neal (1-for-2) plated the final run, putting Carmel up 5-2.

“If we play our best ball, then we’re in a position to win every game,” Neal said. “We put some much emphasis on player development. It’s neat to see the guys reap the benefits of putting in all this hard work.”

Koebcke pitched a near-perfect top of the sixth, tossing 1.0 inning with one hit allowed, a walk and a strikeout. Mathison closed out the seventh after Koebcke, who pitched the night before, walked the Raiders’ No. 1 hitter.

Mathison walked one, struck out one and induced a fly out and a ground out to nail down the win.

Carmel’s testing schedule continues today at 4A No. 3 McCutcheon, followed by 4A No. 4 Mooresville at home on Saturday.

“We’ve got an undefeated team tomorrow, and we’ve got Mooresville, a top-five team, on Saturday, and then we flip around and play a top-10 Zionsville on Monday,” Neal said. “That’s what we want. This is one of the reasons this is a special place. We have access to all of these quality teams, and that just makes us better.”