The Hiland Hawks got a stiff test from Div. III St. Thomas Aquinas on Thursday, April 14 at Lehman Field, but the Hawks emerged victorious thanks in large part to a tremendous mound effort by Jalen Miller and Alex Schmucker. Miller went the first five innings, allowing just two hits, walking one and striking out one. Schmucker then came in and went a perfect two innings in relief to finish the shut-out.

Hiland coach Tom Gibson was ecstatic over Miller’s effort, saying of his left-handed starter, “He really pitched a nice ball game against what I thought was a very good Aquinas team. He stayed around the strike zone the whole game, and even though he wasn’t overpowering, they didn’t really hit the ball hard against him.”

While Miller and Schmucker were busy shutting down Aquinas, Hiland went to work in the first inning, scoring a run. But it wasn’t until the fifth that the Hawks finally put away their opponent. Grant Troyer started the inning by reaching on an error, and Nicky Yoder reached when his sacrifice bunt was thrown into right field, allowing both runners to advance. Up stepped slugging catcher Hayden Mobley, who remained hot by whacking a long double to the gap in right-center, scoring both runners. He then came across on a B.J. Miller sacrifice fly to make it 4-0, and the Hawks were never threatened.

“Gibson said that he felt the Hawks played one of their better all-around games of the season, getting good pitching, timely hitting and plenty of defense, turning three double plays.

“It looked like we had all-stars at every position tonight on defense, “said Gibson with a chuckle. “Nicky and B.J. turned two really quick double plays, and the one that Kenny (Miller) and B.J. turned was on a ball that wasn’t even hit that hard. We really played sound in the field. That’s an effort I will take every night out.”

Hiland finished with eight hits, with Mobley being the only Hawk to garner two.