Athlete of the Week: Hillsdale's Thomas Karpishin

Karpishin kept in that way, allowing just three base runners while firing his first career no-hitter in Hillsdale’s 5-0 win last Monday at Terra Nova. The junior matched his season-high with seven strikeouts. He also hit one batter, and the Knights defense committed two errors behind him.

But the Hillsdale defense bailed him out with two double plays, the second one coming in the seventh inning to finish off the no-no.

“The seventh inning, obviously I was more nervous but I just tired to keep the same stuff,” Karpishin said. “I realized I was getting tired ... so I started throwing a little bit harder. That cost me a little bit and their last hitter got a good piece of one and hit it to left field.”

Hillsdale left fielder J.P. Lyssenko was right there to nab it on a fly, though. Then the junior fired behind the Terra Nova runner at first to double him up for the final out of the game.

“It was a beautiful throw,” Karpishin said.

Karpishin said the celebration was subdued because he wasn’t sure of the scoring decision that put the Terra Nova runner at first base in the seventh. The runner reached on a swinging bunt up the line that got juggled by Hillsdale’s third baseman. Karpishin said he thought the scoring decision could have gone either way.

One of the golden rules of baseball though — especially in the late innings — the first hit must be a clean hit. So the borderline call was quickly scored an error. And Karpishin was able to finish off his bid for Hillsdale history.

“He was hitting spots and all his off-speed stuff was working,” Hillsdale manager James Madison said. “We have a lot of respect Terra Nova and those guys are going to be alright. So to do it against those guys made it even better.”

In his fifth year as the Knights’ manager, Madison has now witnessed two no-hitters. In his first season at Hillsdale in 2014, on the second to last day of the season, then-junior Ro Mahanty fired a no-no against Mills.

As impressive as last Monday’s game-ending double play was, Madison said the play of the game was the first one started by Ro Mahanty’s younger brother, Arjun Mahanty. The play came in the middle innings with a runner on first. A smash got hit to the sure-handed younger Mahanty at shortstop. But things got interesting when the sharp grounder hit the lip of the grass.

“It was a ball that took a bad hop on him,” Madison said. “It hit him in the chest, and off his chest he was able to bare-hand it. There was a lot of luck involved but he kept his composure and we were able to get that double play out of it.”

And the twin-killing gave Karpishin a boost.

“That hyped me up a lot too because double plays, they are very exciting when you’re a pitcher,” Karpishin said.

The junior right-hander is now 3-0 through three starts and owns a 1.27 ERA. More importantly for the Knights, they swept their two-game series with Terra Nova to open Peninsula Athletic League Bay Division play. In fact, because of last week’s persistent rains, Hillsdale and Terra Nova were the only teams in the Bay Division to play both games through the opening week of the league season.

Hillsdale is now riding a five-game winning streak, with its latest victory coming Saturday in a non-league matchup with St. Ignatius.

“We’re doping really well,” Karpishin said. “I know that this team has a lot of talent. But even though we’re rolling we haven’t really hit full speed yet. We haven’t reached our full potential … and I know when we get to where we’re going full steam, we’ll have a really great season, especially near the end.”