Goshen slips past Pilgrims in NLC contest @ BNF
PLYMOUTH Plymouth’s Pilgrims dropped their third in a row, this time to Goshen at Bill Nixon Field by a 4-1 final.
It was another strange night at the ballpark as the top Goshen weapon on offense was a 100-foot fly ball.
Goshen had eight hits on the night, six of which dropped just beyond the outstretched gloves of several Pilgrim fielders.
Meanwhile with opportunities to score at a premium, Plymouth baserunning let Goshen starter Thomas Castillo off the hook several times.
“It’s a little frustrating,” said Plymouth head coach Ryan Wolfe. “We’ve not really made a whole lot of base running mistakes, but we run into a couple tonight. Lot of funny things, some balls drop. You just have to find a way to fight through some of those things.”
It was a rematch of a pitcher’s duel at Goshen that saw Castillo out-duel Plymouth right-hander Matt Manzuk and Castillo was able to do it again allowing just four hits and
“(Matt Manzuk’s) pitched well all year. We just need to find a way to get some more runs across for him”
Plymouth head coach Ryan Wolfe
striking out seven.
It was clear that both coaches knew runs were going to be at a premium as both Wolfe and Goshen coach J.J. Dubois bunted early and often.
“That’s why I bunted Trey (Hall) with one out,” said Wolfe. “You get your hottest hitter, your best hitter at the plate with a guy on second and it didn’t look like that was going to happen that often so I was playing for a run early and they were just able to get ahead enough at the end that we really couldn’t do a lot of bunting.”
Castillo found himself in trouble more than once, but helped himself by making big plays and pitches to extricate himself from trouble.
“Thomas is a competitor and a baseball kid,” said Wolfe of Castillo. “He’s the kind of player any coach would want on his team. Level-headed. He did a good job. I think that we hit him better than we did the
first time. We made some adjustments. A couple of times we ran ourselves out of an inning, but he was able to get out of them.”
Manzuk had a third straight strong outing with nothing to show for it.
“Matt has been good,” said Wolfe of his starting pitcher. “He’s fallen into some hard luck, but he’s been able to make big pitches when he’s needed to and he’s going to continue to be counted on. He’s going to get at least one, maybe two, more starts before the sectional. He’s coming into being the Matt that we know. He’s pitched well all year. We just need to find a way to get some more runs across for him.”
Plymouth (10-12, 5-6) won’t have time to rest as New Prairie will come to Bill Nixon Field tonight at 5:30 p.m. for a non-conference game.
• GOSHEN 4, PLYMOUTH 1 at Plymouth
Goshen 010 002 1 - 4 8 3 Plymouth 001 000 0 - 1 4 1 WP - Castillo (3-4). LP - Manzuk (0-4). 2B - D. Castillo (G).