College World Series: DeNato shuts down Louisville

OMAHA, Neb. --- If pitch count is overrated, then Joey DeNato is Exhibit A.

The junior southpaw’s grittiness earned IU baseball a big win, and set up the Hoosiers’ pitching staff for the stretch-run.

DeNato fired a complete-game shutout as IU beat Louisville 2-0 to win its first College World Series game Saturday at TD Ameritrade Park.

The Hoosiers (49-14) will face Mississippi State at 8 p.m. Monday for a right to advance to the semifinals.

DeNato (10-2) needed 136 pitches to finish off the Cardinals, surrendering just four hits while not allowing a runner past second base.

“In the midst of a game like that, you never think about pitch count or your arm’s getting tired or not,” he said. “My arm felt just as good in the ninth inning as it did in the first.”

Even when DeNato hit 115 pitches through seven innings and 130 through eight, even when two of DeNato’s outs in the latter innings were well-struck liners and he gave up a sharp double with two outs in the eighth, there wasn’t so much as a passing thought of taking him out — from either coach or player.

“I think we were on the same page,” DeNato said. “He knew I wanted to go out and I knew I wanted to go out, so year.”

“We didn’t say one word to each other the entire ballgame. Truth?” IU Coach Tracy Smith asked DeNato.

“Yes.”

“Exactly,” Smith said.
 
Such arm strength at the end of games wasn’t always there for DeNato. At 5-foot-10, he tended to wear down toward the end of seasons, and has pitched in the Cape Cod League the past two summers.

He decided to not throw this fall, and the time off has paid dividends while he rehabbed and strengthened his arm.

“Last year at this point during the season, I know my arm definitely wasn’t 100 percent,” said DeNato, who finished with eight strikeouts and three walks. “And this year, I really focused on taking care of my arm and doing rehab and all that stuff every single week.

“Now my arm feels just as strong as it did day one.”

DeNato’s outing could hardly have come at a better time. The Hoosiers managed just seven hits and twice ran themselves out of scoring opportunities, leaving 11 men on base in all.

It also snaps a streak of three consecutive games in which an IU starter failed to finish the sixth inning — included DeNato’s three-inning clunker against Florida State on June 8 — and allows Smith flexibility with his pitching staff.

“That’s the tone setter for the whole week that we’re here,” sophomore catcher Kyle Schwarber said. “I feel like that’s gonna play a big role in the morale of our bullpen and our starting pitchers.”

Smith did not name a starter for Game 2, saying he wanted to further evaluate how his pitchers match up with Mississippi State.

He can go with Big Ten Pitcher of the Year Aaron Slegers, who has struggled in his last two postseason starts, freshman left-hander Will Coursen-Carr, who is 3-0 with a 2.49 ERA in 18.1 innings this postseason, or lefty sophomore Kyle Hart, who hasn’t pitched since May 25 vs. Nebraska in the Big Ten Tournament.

“That was huge,” Smith said of DeNato’s performance. “Our mindset coming into the game was (to) stay in the winner’s bracket. If we had to use tomorrow’s starter, we were going to do it.”

But as IU polished its first College Series win on its first try, the night belonged to DeNato.

Among his eight strike outs were three of the caught-looking variety — he froze a different hitter in the fourth, fifth and eighth on inside fastballs — illustrating the superb command he had of all three of his pitches.

“That’s the first time he’s thrown three pinpoint around the corner and he got three strike outs on it,” Schwarber said. “It was great that he was having his control on everything. I mean, his changeup was phenomenal.

“There really wasn’t anything that wasn’t working for him.”

IU jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first when sophomore designated hitter Scott Donley singled up the middle, scoring Schwarber. Junior outfielder Will Nolden was picked off trying to steal third by Louisville starter Chad Green, who lasted just two-plus innings.

The Hoosiers tacked on their second run in third on senior shortstop Michael Basil’s RBI single to left, that scored Nolden before Schwarber was gunned down at the plate by CoCo Johnson.

Nolden returned the favor in the bottom of the third. Cole Sturgeon singled sharply to right, and Nolden gunned home to nail Sutton Whiting, who was trying to score from second. Nolden hit Schwarber on the fly, and the catcher was waiting for Whiting.

Green (10-4) allowed two earned runs with four strike outs and four walks for Louisville (51-13).