Vondohlen cousins keep battery charged at Stewarts Creek
The pitcher and catcher are often referred to as a team's battery.
Stewarts Creek's battery in the first round of the Class AAA baseball tournament was powered by blood.
As they've done many times, cousins Maddox and Chase Vondohlen played another game of catch. This time, it was at Oakland High School, and the pair were helping the Red Hawks beat Houston in the opening round.
Maddox, a senior pitcher, needed only 55 pitches and the Red Hawks needed only five innings for a 10-0 victory over Houston.
"He knows what I want to throw and when I want to throw it," he said, "so that helps out a lot."
"He's accurate," says Chase, a junior catcher. "Everything he throws is good. His change-up is really good. He's a great pitcher."
Stewarts Creek pitching coach Charlie Mitchell, a former major-league pitcher, knows the importance of their relationship.
"It helps, especially if you like each other," Mitchell said. "They're cousins and they're good cousins. Chase knows Maddox and Maddox knows Chase."
And Houston now knows how formidable the combination is. The Mustangs mustered only two hits off Maddox.
"We keep up with the first- and second-pitch strikes," Mitchell said, "and he's not usually going to go 2-0 on people. He did a couple of times, but with him, you've got confidence he's going to come back and not walk guys."
And once the Red Hawks scored four runs in the second inning, the team could be even more confident.
"If he gets even a one-run lead," Stewarts Creek coach Mike Bartlett said, "he's just going to pound it and trust our guys to play defense.
The Vondohlens were part of a Red Hawks' team that went to the state tournament for the first time last year. Stewarts Creek won twice, but bowed out of the tournament short of its goal.
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"We're really hungry this year," Chase said. "Last year, we were close, so this year, we want it even more."
That's a sentiment shared by the entire team, who couldn't have asked for a better start to the tournament.
"Everybody on this team's my brother," Chase Vondohlen said.
"We're just related by blood."
