Crusaders stop Legacy in baseball

Faith Lutheran senior pitcher Sean McCart took a simple approach to his outing Wednesday:
Throw strikes, change speeds and mix locations.

And keeping it simple worked perfectly for the Crusaders left-hander.

McCart allowed just four hits and three walks while striking out eight in six solid innings as the Crusaders (3-7, 1-1 Northwest League) downed visiting Legacy, 3-1.

“He hit his spots well,” Faith Lutheran baseball coach Tony Girod said.

McCart threw a two-seam and a four-seam fastball, a changeup and a curveball effectively. Two of the Longhorns’ hits stayed in the infield, and Legacy (3-6, 1-1) had only one runner advance safely past second base.

“I was just able to locate my fastball, and I was able to keep them off-balance with my changeup,” said

McCart, who earlier in the day committed to play baseball at George Washington next season.

The Longhorns seemed to have trouble guessing what McCart would throw next, as he often kept fastballs up in the zone and his offspeed pitches low.

And it didn’t hurt that McCart had a 3-0 lead after the first inning.

J.B. Eary started the uprising with a one-out single and scored on Michael Kinkenon’s double to left. Caleb Summerhays followed with a run-scoring single to left to make it 2-0.

Summerhays stole second and continued to third on a throwing error, then came home on Tyler Trageton’s groundout.

“That was a huge morale boost for us,” McCart said. “To get them 1-2-3 in the first and then score those runs right away was just huge.”

Josh Murtha tossed a perfect seventh inning, striking out two, to pick up the save.