High school baseball: Trevor Kitzberger pitching, consistent hitting power Brookside over Clearview

SHEFFIELD – After a slow start to the baseball season thanks to Mother Nature, Brookside seems to be heading in the right direction after posting a 13-2 Lorain County League win over Clearview on Thursday.While nine Cardinal hitters banged out 12 hits against three Clipper pitchers, scoring six times in the first two innings, the highlight of the day for Brookside was junior pitcher Trevor Kitzberger.In his first start of the year, Kitzberger went the distance allowing just the two earned runs, four hits, only three walks while striking out a career-high 14 Clearview hitters."Trevor has always been a strike thrower, he is someone we trust on the mound, and we'll put him out there against anybody," Cards coach Travis Baldwin said. "He is going to throw strikes, fill up the zone and get outs, however that comes.""When we have a lead like that, I just have to trust my pitches and fill up the strike zone," Kitzberger said. "I was 90 percent fastballs today and mixed in some sliders and a few change ups. Just about everything was finding the strike zone today. I just want to be unpredictable to the hitters."Brookside got going right away as Easton Weber singled and Danny Fries walked to start the game. Liam Ebner had the first of his three hits with a run-scoring single and Austin Lara made it 2-0 with a grounder to third.The Cardinals added all the insurance runs they would need, scoring four times in the second inning.Fries sent a run home with a groundball to short, Ebner sent a run home on a ground ball to first that was misplayed, Lara singled home a run and Ryan Albaugh had a single to right that made the score 6-0.After a 1-2-3 inning by Clearview starting pitcher, Nate Bristor, in the third, the Clippers came up with their only runs of the game in the bottom half of the third.Joseph Stephens walked and Qudo Grant singled to right to put runners on for Bristor who crushed a deep double to right over the outfielder's head to send both runners home to cut the lead to 6-2.After the two runs were allowed, Kitzberger struck out six of the next seven Clearview (0-3, 0-2) batters.Bristor was literally knocked out of the game in the top of the fourth when an Ebner hit went up the middle, catching Bristor in the hip area. Michael Mincy replaced him on the mound.Mincy did a respectable job, allowing three runs over the next three innings before tiring in the seventh."I'm very happy with the way Mike pitched today," Clippers coach Ryan Vargo said. "I knew he could pitch a little bit. We had some rough bullpen sessions and to see him get thrown in there and compete the way he did makes me happy."This is a team that has already been through way too much adversity, losing five starters before the start of the season. We have guys who have never played baseball and we're just trying to get a little bit better every day."