Hoelzen throws no-hitter in sweep

MINDEN - If the rest of the Northern 4A hadn't taken notice of Douglas left Tyler Hoelzen before Saturday, that'll probably change now.

Hoelzen tossed a no-hitter against North Valleys Saturday morning, striking out 10 and walking two in seven innings of work as the Douglas baseball team picked up a 5-0 win to open a doubleheader.

The Tigers capped off a three-game sweep of the Panthers with a 9-3 win in the nightcap to improve to 10-2 in Sierra League play.

Hoelzen's performance, though, was the highlight of the day as he cleaned up the Panther lineup using just 85 pitches in seven innings of work. He struck out the side on 12 pitches in the top of the seventh to seal up the win.

"I was trying not to think about it," Hoelzen said. "I saw what was going on, but I was just trying to keep the ball down and let the defense make some plays behind me. They had a great day.

"It's hard to grasp right now what happened. It's a good feeling. I've never had a no-hitter before, not even in Little League. It's a big accomplishment."

Douglas coach John Glover was equally pleased.

"He just had a great outing," Glover said. "He threw as well as I've seen him throw. We played good defense behind him, he threw a lot of strikes and it was just fun to watch him."

Hoelzen has quietly become one of the top pitchers in the region over the past few weeks. He has 31 strikeouts in five appearances and has put together a 4-1 record on the mound. He's allowed just one hit in his last 11 innings of work.

Saturday was his first start in three weeks, though.

"My shoulder stiffened up after the Wooster series in March," said Hoelzen, who missed the Carson series completely the next week. "It started feeling better last week and it felt great today.

"My fastball was going, I was working a lot with the cutter, just trying to keep the ball down in the zone."

Douglas got RBIs from Jordan Hadlock and Tim Rudnick in the win, which was much closer than the final score indicated.

Hadlock scored on a Rudnick grounder to the right side in the bottom of the first and Troy Torres scored on a Hadlock single in the third for a 2-0 lead.

Until the sixth inning, that was all the Tiger bats could muster against Panther starter Jared Harvey, who finished with six strikeouts.

Second baseman Jeff Crozier led the bottom of the sixth off with a single up the middle and Zach McFadden was hit by a pitch.

Hoelzen reached on an error that allowed Crozier and McFadden to score and Hoelzen later scored on another error to wrap up the Tigers' run production for the game.

In game two, Hadlock went 3-for-3 with a home run and four RBI, Kameron VanWinkle and Michael Whalin each doubled and drove in a run and Rudnick and Torres picked up Douglas' remaining RBI.

Rudnick started the game on the mound, striking out three and allowing just two hits, but VanWinkle picked up the win with three innings of relief work and three strikeouts.