Nixon simply perfect against Commodores

MINSTER - Five innings into Minster's Division IV baseball sectional title game against Perry on Wednesday night, the thought of throwing a perfect game couldn't elude the mind of Wildcat pitcher Josh Nixon.

Two quick innings later, that was no longer a thought - it was a reality.

The junior right-hander struck out eight and the Wildcats manufactured a pair of runs early in a 2-0 victory at Hanover Street Park to advance to next Wednesday's Coldwater district semifinal to play Spencerville.

"I just kind of looked up there (in the fifth inning) and thought 'There's a lot of zeros up on the board right now,' " Nixon recalled. "I tried not to think about it as I got on the mound, but it kind of kept creeping up, especially in that last inning. Thankfully I finished it off."

And it took a few imperfectly perfect plays from the Minster defense to keep the dream alive.

Third baseman Matthew Trushaw took a ground ball off the chest and made a throw to first in time for an out. First baseman J.R. Nixon, Josh's brother, jumped off the bag to snatch an errant throw and tag out a runner before he reached first. And in the seventh, speedy center fielder Bryce Schmiesing chased down a hard shot off the bat of J.R. King that was headed for the left-center gap.

"There were some big plays," Minster coach Mike Wiss said, "and I told them 'Sometimes in these games, somebody is going to have the chance to be the hero. In the third inning, you're not going to know that's the hero play.

"Josh is going to get a lot of credit for what occurred tonight, and I'm going to flip him the game ball, and I'm going to say congratulations to our team because you just got off of our field and advanced to the next round."

On the next at-bat following Schmiesing's catch, Josh Nixon rang up Chad Hanson to cap off what Wiss believes might be the first perfect game in school history.

"I don't know that we've ever had a perfect game. I know that we've been within one or two batters of perfect games," Wiss said, "but from Adam Niemeyer, Austin Knapke, Allan Heitbrink, Brian Heitkamp years ago, and Josh today, that's pretty good company."

"There's been a lot of good pitchers come through here - (former Wildcat and current Ohio State pitcher) Adam Niemeyer especially," Nixon said. "We went and watched him a couple weeks ago down at (the University of Cincinnati) and he pitched real nice. It's nice company to be in, but I'm more happy with the win so we can move on here."

The perfect game overshadowed a great effort by Perry freshman Austin Money, who allowed just two hits and one earned run in six innings of work. Money hit leadoff batter Peter Falk in the first and he later scored on a wild pitch. In the second inning, Ben Stubbs gave Minster its last run with a two-out RBI single to bring home Brett Hoelscher, who had worked his way to third on a pair of errors.

"I thought their guy threw a pretty darn nice baseball game," Wiss said. "He kept our guys off-balance. Our early-to-middle hitters were getting the ball off the end of the bat. Honestly, we have not seen many 3-1 off-speed, many 2-0 off-speed, and that's what he threw. It got us, and anybody on a given day, to start thinking fat and then we'd miss it.

"In every tournament game I've ever coached, I always ask: No. 1) Win the first three innings and 2) Make the opponent make plays."

Nixon's performance came a little more than a week removed from a game in which he flirted with a no-hitter against Coldwater, a contest which took a turn for the worst in the sixth as the Cavaliers rallied off seven unearned runs in the final two innings for a 7-6 win. Nixon improved to 6-1 on the season. It was his second no-hitter dating back to last summer when he and Aaron Ernst combined for one in a six-inning 10-0 victory over Houston in ACME play.

"I guess if you're the only one to throw a perfect game, that's pretty special," Nixon said. "Right now, I'm just enjoying the win. We're obviously moving on to district. This is definitely a good win for us. Now we've just got to get the bats out because two hits for us isn't going to do it moving forward."