Nick Romie Dominant as East Central Advances

By Ben Grossberg

Shelbyville – East Central and Bloomington South faced off in the first semifinal of Sectional 14 on Saturday. East Central Senior, and Indiana Tech commit, Nick Romie got the ball. He was in control of the game throughout throwing all seven innings to get the win.

In the first inning with two outs East Central got on the scoreboard with a solo homerun. Senior AJ Schomber turned on a fastball from South starter Junior Gage Rogers driving it over the right field fence.

Both pitchers worked through the second seamlessly, but got touched up in the third inning. Ken Holloway drove in a run with a RBI infield single for East Central. South got to Romie with a two out RBI single from Gage Rogers.

East Central gave Romie another run to work with in the top of the fourth when Senior Spencer Gutapfel singled in the third run of the game.

South cut the deficit to one in the fifth inning when Vanderbilt commit Nolan Rogers drew a two out walk and stole second. Jordan Parrot then came through with a clutch two out hit scoring Rogers and cutting the lead to 3-2.

In the sixth Joe Crider provided a little excitement for South, with a runner on first he hit a deep drive to left, but left fielder Peyton Stonefield tracked it down and caught the ball about five feet short of the fence to end the inning.

Romie came back to the mound in the seventh to finish off his great performance. After striking out the first two batters of the inning he hit the nine hitter, Austin Knapp, to bring Nolan Rogers to the plate. Unfazed Romie induced a ground ball to the second baseman to end the game. Romie went all seven allowing two runs, four hits, three walks, and struck out ten. With the win East Central advances to the Sectional 14 Championship against Bloomington North on Monday at 3 pm.