[Stardust]

It was almost exactly a month ago that the Holy Cross baseball team blasted Walton-Verona, 13-3, but that result means nothing when the two teams face each other in a more meaningful game this morning.

That’s when they will play a quarterfinal game of the Touchstone Energy All ‘A’ Classic State Tournament at 9 a.m. at Whitaker Bank Ballpark in Lexington with the winner advancing to Saturday night’s 6 o’clock semifinal game.

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The championship game is scheduled for 10 a.m. on Sunday.

Holy Cross (16-6), the champion of the Ninth Region, advanced to the quarterfinal with a 7-1 upset win over 12th Region champion Danville in a sectional tournament game on April 25. Danville was ranked No. 9 in the state at the time and the Indians beat standout pitcher Rob Caudill, who had just signed with Division I Davidson. The win also catapulted Holy Cross into the top 25 rankings, but the Indians have since fallen out.

Walton-Verona (20-8), the champion of the Eighth Region, advanced with an 11-4 win over Fifth Region champion Washington County in a sectional tournament game on April 25. That win was Walton-Verona’s 10th in a row, but its winning streak ended with a 12-2 loss to Owen County on Thursday.

Walton-Verona coach Kevin McIntyre said his team has played well in almost every game all season, but played perhaps its worst game in that loss to Holy Cross on April 3.

“They kicked our but, but we had a couple of errors, we didn’t play good defense, had a couple off picked off bases, we were just awful,” said McIntyre. “After the game I told (Holy Cross coach Mike Holtz), ‘I apologize, but we’re not this bad.’ We had bad day against a very good team.”

Holtz said he’s already talked to his players about that game have no relevance to Saturday’s game.

“I think our guys have a very good amount of respect for Walton-Verona,” said Holtz. “We could tell they were a solid team, but sometimes you just have those days. I knew that game doesn’t reflect how good they are. Bottom line is we have to beat them today to advance and that’s all that matters.”

Both teams have deep pitching staffs and both coaches said they won’t be holding anything back in hopes of “saving,” a pitcher for either the semifinal or championship games.

Walton-Verona, which is appearing in its fourth All ‘A’ Classic State Tournament since its inception in 2004 did the lose the services of senior Dustin Cottrell as pitcher to injury, but he is still able to play the field and hit. Sophomore left-hander Christian Lohr, who earned the win against Washington County, is 5-1 with a 0.67 ERA, while sophomore Daniel Tilley, who shut out Eminence in the Eight Region All ‘A’ Classic semifinals, is 3-0 with a 0.30 ERA and sophomore Joe Sargent, who shut out Owen County in the Eighth Region All ‘A’ Classic championship game, is 2-1 with a 0.65 ERA.

“If we play defense it gives us a chance to beat anybody,” said McIntyre. “We got a lot of confidence going during the (10-game) winning streak, because we pitched well, played good defense and got some timely hitting and we came back a few times late to win games, too.”

Holy Cross, which finished as state runner-up in 2009, also has a deep pitching staff led by senior Kyle Fuller, who shut out Newport Central Catholic in the championship game of the Ninth Region All ‘A’ Classic, junior Blake Tiberi, who fired a no-hitter in a Ninth Region All ‘A’ Classic semifinal win over St. Henry and tossed a four-hitter against Danville, and senior Joe Woeste, who has a 0.64 ERA.

The Holy Cross baseball team has perhaps a little extra incentive, too, as it is three wins away from joining the football team, boys’ basketball team and volleyball team as state champions this school year.

“The big thing is these kids know it can be done, because some of them have been on teams that have already done it and if they weren’t they’ve seen it can happen,” said Holtz. “There’s a belief we can win it. I want them to go down and enjoy the trip, but we’re going down really believing we can win the whole thing.”http://preps.cincinnati.com/nky