The calendar just turned to April, but it isn’t too early for Community R-6 to make strides in its district.

The Trojans defeated their fourth district opponent in as many games when they beat Madison 13-2 in five innings on Friday. They won their Central Activities Conference opener while being away from home in their home contest in Mexico due to wet field conditions.

After defeating four of the five other teams in the district, Community R-6 head coach Chris Ellersieck said the Trojans (5-2, 1-0 CAC) pretty much secured at least a No. 2 seed. In a week expected to be more packed, Community had a few days since its previous game because of a weather cancellation at Silex on Wednesday.

Community R-6 vs Madison Photo Gallery

“We took a deep breath,” Ellersieck said. “We knew we were running out of arms coming into this game. We had Houston (Hogan) pitch, and Houston’s pitched for us in the fall. He has been our 3 or 4 guy since I’ve been here, and he was able to come out and pitch a decent game tonight.”

Hogan made his season mound debut against Madison (0-7, 0-1 CAC) as he pitched five innings with five strikeouts, two hits, one earned run and one walk. After a slow start by allowing two runs in the first inning, Hogan slammed the door the rest of the way.

“It felt pretty good getting back into the pitching habitat,” Hogan said. “I was finding the strike zone. That first walk killed us. After I found it, it went pretty well.”

Ellersieck said Community has had good outings from Cooper Rohan and Kyler Swaim already. Whenever the Trojans hit a week like this and need to find some innings later in the season, he said having Hogan pitch well will help the team.

“It’s incredibly important for us to have more than one kid that can throw,” Ellersieck said. “I feel really confident with the kids we put on the mound each and every night. We can throw strikes, and we can play with anybody.”

Hogan also had the two-RBI double that pushed the margin to 10 runs to satisfy the run-rule requirement. Cooper Rohan finished 2-for-4 with a RBI double, and Nik Crider, Kyler Swaim, Connor Maxwell and Kaiden Erdel each had one RBI.

Playing the infield, particularly third base, is the main way Hogan wants to help the team this season but will be ready whenever he’s called upon for mound duty. He said he wants to contribute every day so it felt good to drive in two runs against Madison.

“It felt really good,” Hogan said. “It was my first double of the season. Hopefully, there’s more to come.”

Hogan said Community wants to beat North Shelby later in the season to rise even higher in the district standings. He said North Shelby is the biggest threat but believes the Trojans can win.

Ellersieck said wanted to see “hard work” against Madison in the form of the Trojans “putting the bat on the ball,” “running hard” and “playing good solid defense.” He liked how they set the tone early in the conference schedule with great baserunning. They finished with 10 steals.

“We ran the basepaths pretty well,” Ellersieck said. “We were able to read passed balls and wild pitches. We were able to beat out and run out a lot of ground balls today that helped us get baserunners.”

Before facing the rest of its challenging conference schedule and North Shelby, Ellersieck said Community needs to put the ball in play more instead of striking out. 

“With time, baseball is a game if you hit it three out of 10 times, you’re doing a good job,” Ellersieck said. “If our kids continue to have a good attitude, good mindset and good approach when they step into the box, I think they’ll be able to hit.”