Springs Valley Community High School

As the Springs Valley baseball team opened its home slate on Saturday against Vincennes Rivet, the scoreboard above the right-field fence was illuminated with a pair of zeroes. As the cold, windy afternoon went on, one of those zeroes would disappear. The other one wouldn’t. Springs Valley starting pitcher Kaden Dunn made his debut against the Patriots and — along with Braylon Kovas, who came on in relief to start the fifth inning — kept that zero glowing exactly as it did to start the game. The cousins, Dunn a junior and Kovas a freshman, combined to not only throw a six-inning shutout, but to put another zero in the box score as well. Dunn and Kovas didn’t just hold Rivet to zero runs, they held the Patriots to zero hits as well. They threw a combined no-hitter as the Blackhawks won 10-0. “Any time you can hold a team to no hits, it’s a special day and it should be for a pitcher. It doesn’t matter who’s out there, it’s just tough. The ball always seems to find a hole at some point,” Springs Valley coach Rob Denbo said. “We did a good job and it’s great for them especially because they’re cousins, they’ve looked forward to playing together, and they worked together all winter. “It’s cool for them to combine for it if we’re going to do it that way.” Despite the poor weather on Saturday and a delayed start time because of it, the Blackhawks still approached the game with excitement. They were fired up to play a home game and have a chance to get in the win column after suffering a season-opening loss a couple of days earlier. Denbo was glad to see that, as it was a crucial part of the win. “I liked our enthusiasm. Being excited to do something is a great way to start and I felt like we were that way Thursday, but we lost momentum when we started committing some errors,” Denbo said. “We were sharper today, our pitchers threw strikes, and we didn’t have to make a lot of plays, but we made the plays we had to make.” Springs Valley put up 10 runs against Rivet, but it was far from perfect at the plate. Of the Blackhawks’ 10 hits, none were for extra bases and none of them were hit particularly hard. On the flip side of that though, they did get to showcase their ability to get the job done on the basepaths. They pressured the Patriots with their speed all afternoon, finishing with seven stolen bases as a team. “We’ve still got a ways to go offensively. We didn’t really hit the ball that hard today and the wind was an issue, but we still have to get better at the plate. We have to get it in our heads that we’re going up there to drive the ball,” Denbo said. “There’s never enough runs, so we’ve got some work to do, but they did put it in play, they did run, and they were aggressive on the basepaths which was all good to see.” Springs Valley (1-1) is in for a long week now. The Blackhawks are scheduled to play next on Tuesday, traveling to North Daviess, and after that they’ll host Scottsburg on Wednesday, Eastern (Pekin) on Thursday, and Patoka Lake Athletic Conference foe Mitchell on Saturday. Each of those teams will provide a challenge and with weather expected to pop up on Tuesday and Wednesday it’s unsure which of the games will and won’t be played, but Springs Valley will attack that strong string of opponents with hopes of finding out exactly what they’re capable of as a unit. “We’re going to see how good we are. These guys have a lot of confidence and baseball’s such a mental game so you have to have confidence to at least get it started,” Denbo said. “Four games in five days is hard enough, but when you’re playing that quality of teams along the way, it’ll really show what we’re made out of and we’re going to find out if we can remain confident.” BLACKHAWKS 10, PATRIOTS 0 VINCENNES RIVET;|;SPRINGS VALLEY ;AB;R;H;BI;|;;AB;R;H;BI Webber 2b;2;0;0;0;|;B Kovas 2b, p;3;1;1;0 Fray ss;2;0;0;0;|;Land lf;3;1;1;1 Herman 1b;2;0;0;0;|;Cruz ss;4;1;2;0 Early cf, p;2;0;0;0;|;Hammond c;4;0;3;2 Lemon 3b;2;0;0;0;|;C Kovas 3b;1;1;0;0 A Bilskie lf;2;0;0;0;|;Chase cf;4;2;1;1 Dodd lf;0;0;0;0;|;Allstott rf;3;2;2;1 Daugherty dh;1;0;0;0;|;Phillips dh;2;0;1;1 H Bilskie c;2;0;0;0;|;Dunn p;3;0;0;0 Lane p, cf;2;0;0;0;|;Buchanan 2b;0;0;0;0 |;Pantoja cr;0;2;0;0 Totals;17;0;0;0;|;Totals;27;10;11;6 Vincennes Rivet (0-2);000;000—0 Springs Valley (1-1);202;402—10 E: Vincennes Rivet 1, Springs Valley 0. LOB: Springs Valley 7, Vincennes Rivet 2. SB: C Kovas 2, Chase, Phillips, B Kovas, Cruz, Pantoja, Herman. CS: Webber. S: Fray. SF: Phillips. ;;IP;H;R;ER;BB;SO Vincennes Rivet;Lane (0-1);3.0;6;4;3;2;3 Early;2.1;5;6;4;1;2 Springs Valley;Dunn (1-0);4.0;0;0;0;1;6 ;B Kovas;2.0;0;0;0;1;5 HBP: C Kovas 2 (by Lane), Allstott (by Early). WP: Early 2, Dunn. Photos by Mia Cruz