No. 3 New London unshaken by Notre Dame

NEW LONDON — The Notre Dame baseball team had scored 58 runs over its last four games coming into Saturday night’s Class 1A Substate 6 semifinal against No. 3 New London. On Saturday, the Nikes scored zero.

Tiger senior Dereck Santiago dominated the Notre Dame bats and New London scored five runs in the bottom of the fourth as the Tigers moved on to the Substate 6 final with a 5-0 victory.

Santiago gave up just four hits all night and walked just one batter in six dominant innings. He struck out eight batters on the day, and Kooper Schulte fanned three in the seventh to keep the Nikes scoreless.

“I always trust in my pitches,” Santiago said. “I just came here and did my job.”

Santiago did have to throw 96 pitches in the game, making him unavailable for the final on Tuesday night, but Coach Brad Helmerson says he’s got plenty of confidence in the rest of the Tigers’ arms.

“We would have loved to put that five up earlier in the game and maybe he could have been available Tuesday,” Helmerson said. “But I've got all the faith in the world with the rest of our pitchers too, and we'll be fine.”

The runs that did come came off the bats of five seniors. Carter Allen got things started with an RBI double, which scored another senior in Tucker Gibbar. Seth Bailey, Josh Catala, Kooper Schulte and Santiago would all drive runs in.

Allen went 2-for-2 with a triple, a double and an RBI to lead the Tigers. No other New London batter had multiple hits.

What made New London’s fourth inning more impressive is who the runs came off of. Notre Dame’s Jackson Brent led the Nikes to an upset of Keota in the quarterfinals, and he looked on pace for another big game after three frames.

“We knew Jack would be as good as anybody we've seen all year,” Helmerson said. “Those guys are tough to beat three times in a year. Anytime they're coming here, you know you're going to get a game.”

But as it is, New London did beat their rivals to the east thrice in 2022. The Tigers have now won five-straight games over the Nikes.

New London (27-1) will face Moravia (21-6) in the substate final at Ottumwa on Tuesday. The Mohawks beat Sigourney 20-9 in the other semifinal.