Ironton shuts down Minford to claim first district title since 2003
- Staff
- May 31
- 3 min read
ATHENS — Allyn’s Jewelry may be gone, but the Ironton Fighting Tigers might want to think of starting their own jewelry store and they can start with pitcher Ian Ginger.
“Ginger pitched a gem,” said Ironton coach John Hunt after Ginger pitched a two-hit shutout and Ironton blanked the Minford Falcons 4-0 in the Division 5 district championship at Bob Wren Stadium on Saturday.
“The defense was stout as well. We played the game well on both sides of the white lines. We had a few clutch hits that gave us some runs and Ginger never let up.”
Ginger faced just 22 batters — one over the minimum — as he struck out six and walked one and did not allow a runner to second base. Of the 71 pitches he threw, 52 were strikes.
“We lost our sophomore year to Wheelersburg. You don’t want to have that in your mind. I did because we weren’t losing again. I told myself that,” said Ginger.
“I wasn’t nervous. We felt we worked our tails off. We had a goal and we were going to achieve this goal. We had clutch hitting. And we made plays in the field. The plays in the field were absolutely crazy. We had a big double play at the end. I couldn’t have a better defense behind me.”
Ironton (18-3) will play Cincinnati Miami Valley Christian Academy at 5 p.m. on Tuesday at Mason High School.
Tuesday’s winners will meet on Wednesday and that winner goes to the state semifinals on Friday.
Minford (10-10) had upset No.3 seed Zane Trace in the semifinals 10-2.
The district title was the first for Ironton in 22 seasons.
“We said we aren’t losing this because I don’t want to feel the way I did my sophomore year. We had to get this done. We broke the streak. It was 22 years today when we won our last district,” said Ginger.
Ironton got all the runs it really needed with a pair in the second inning.
Jacob Hughes and Braydon Baker each walked to start the inning and Tanner Kleinman singled to load the bases.
Carter Bridges hit a sacrifice fly to score Hughes and Carson Freeman singled home the second run.
The Fighting Tigers added a pair of insurance runs in the sixth inning.
Ginger and Hughes singled to begin the rally and moved up on a passed ball. An outlier, Kleinman came up clutch with a two-run single.
Kleinman finished 2-3 with two runs batted in at the plate, Bridges 1-1 with an RBI, Freeman 1-3 with an RBI, Hughes 1-2 and Ginger 1-3.
Lukas Bradley took the loss as he gave up six hits, four earned runs with six strikeouts and two walks.
Bradley and Pierce Banks had the only hits for the Falcons. Both were singles and both hitters were thrown out trying to stretch the hit into a double.
Minford 000 000 0 = 0 2 0
Ironton 020 002 x = 4 6 0
Lukas Bradley and J.D. Matiz. Ian Ginger and Jacob Hughes. W–Ginger (IP-7.0, H-2, R-0, K-6, BB-1). L–Bradley (IP-6.0, H-6, R-4, ER-4, K-6, BB-2). Hitting–Minford: Bradley 1-3, Banks 1-1; Ironton: Ian Ginger 1-3, Jacob Hughes 1-2, Tanner Kleinman 2-3 2-RBI, Carter Bridges 1-1 RBI SF, Carson Freeman 1-3 RBI.
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