Published: June 17, 2007 01:42 am            

Cathedral beats Kokomo in championship

INDIANAPOLIS — The IHSAA Class 4A baseball state championship game featured a pair of outstanding left-handed pitchers in Indianapolis Cathedral senior Anthony Agnew and Kokomo junior Bryce Robinson.

Agnew, who had the experience of pitching in the state finals last season, stole the show in leading the Fighting Irish to a 7-2 win Saturday night at Victory Field.

Agnew (13-0) took a one-hit shutout into the seventh inning and finished with a four-hitter. He struck out eight and walked just one in an efficient 94-pitch performance.

“He was phenomenal,” Cathedral coach Rich Andriole said. “I thought he pitched better [Saturday] than he probably pitched in his last two outings. I thought he showed more command of his off-speed stuff. … He was hitting his spots. He worked in, he worked out and he worked ahead with his breaking stuff. He did a great job.”

Cathedral (29-4) took the state crown after finishing as runner-up to Fort Wayne Snider last season. Agnew had to settle for a tough-luck no-decision in that game.

Andrew Quinnette finished 2-for-3 to lead the Kats, but Agnew otherwise shut down the Red and Blue attack. Cathedral jumped out to a 3-0 lead after the first two innings to give Agnew all the run support he would need.

“He is 13-0 for a reason,” Kokomo coach Steve Edwards said. “We just didn’t hit the ball really well. We knew we were going to have to come out here and score some runs early and put the pressure on them. When they scored that first run, I think it kind of put a little pressure on us.”

Robinson (10-1) had an up-and-down performance. He settled down after a rocky start and pitched into the seventh inning before running out of gas. He worked 62/3 innings and allowed seven runs and 10 hits. He struck out four, walked four and hit three batters. He also had three wild pitches — two of which came in the final inning.

“He pitched pretty well, he just started to wear down toward the end,” Edwards said. “We knew they were going to put the ball in play and they did that including some dink hits. They manufactured some runs early and they added some runs late which is what you have to do to win the state championship.”

Agnew improved to 20-1 in his career while Robinson dropped to 19-1 with his senior season to go.

Cathedral owned the first two innings. The Fighting Irish scored a run in the first and two more runs in the second while the Kats went scoreless and sent the minimum six batters to the plate.

In the first inning, Jack Lupo led off with a double down the left-field line and took third when the relay throw to second went awry. Agnew followed with an infield groundout to score Lupo for a 1-0 Irish lead.

“I thought that was humongous because you read all these things about guys and … Bryce is out there and you know he is good. He had 129 strikeouts in [76 innings pitched coming in],” Andriole said. “For Jack to get us going like that, I thought that gave us a huge boost.

“And then in the bottom of the inning, after Anthony gave up a lead-off walk, we got a 1-6-3 double play. That was huge too.”

In the second inning, the Irish packaged a single, a hit batsman and a walk to load the bases with no outs. No. 9 hitter Patrick Paligraf followed with an RBI single to left for a 2-0 lead. Robinson retired Lupo on an infield pop-up, but Agnew jumped on the first pitch he saw for a sacrifice fly to right field that made it 3-0.

Robinson settled in from there and held the Irish scoreless over the third, fourth and fifth innings to give the Kats a chance at a comeback.

Agnew refused to let that happen. He took a no-hitter into the fourth inning. Quinnette broke it up with a clean single, but Agnew followed with a strikeout to end the inning.

Cathedral looked in total control in the sixth. No. 8 hitter Steve Darragh smacked an RBI double for a 4-0 lead in the top of the inning and Agnew struck out the side in the bottom of the frame.

Cathedral tacked on three more runs in the seventh and knocked out Robinson in the process. Cameron Cunningham relieved and retired the only batter he faced.

Kokomo refused to go down without a fight, which was a quality it showed all season. Quinnette led off the bottom of the seventh with a double and one out later, Robinson ripped a triple to the right-field corner for the Kats’ first run. Evan Skiles scored Robinson with a two-out single, but Agnew followed with his eighth and final strikeout to end the game.

The Irish featured a balanced attack. Agnew drove in a pair of runs to help his own cause and the bottom three hitters in their order, Tony Ranek, Darragh and Paligraf, went a combined 6-for-7 and reached base 10 times. Ranek scored three runs and Paligraf drove in two.

“We knew they could hit the ball,” Edwards said. “I said they were balanced from top to bottom and they proved that.”

Kokomo, which was making its first state finals appearance since 1988, finished with a 28-4 record.

“I’m very proud of our kids. We made an unbelievable run and had an unbelievable experience.,” Edwards said. “Of course, we would have loved to win this game and bring a state championship back to Kokomo, but hopefully our young kids learn from this experience and hopefully we’re here to stay for awhile.”

        

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