Right on schedule, the Northwest Christian High School baseball program is poised to hang another title banner.

Four seasons after taking over 2017’s 3A Conference state champion--and bringing his son with him--former major league pitcher Bob Howry has the Crusaders two games from their first North Central Region title after an 11-0 win in six innings Friday, April 23, at Chino Valley.

“You can’t take anyone lightly,” cautioned Howry, who could clinch his first regional title with a doubleheader sweep of Page on Saturday, May 1. “But we’ve definitely put ourselves in the driver’s seat as far as controlling our own destiny, getting a home seed and winning the region.”

Howry’s son Ty, a senior, led an 11-hit parade with three runs batted in as starting first baseman, three days after striking out 14 Cougars and throwing all but nine pitches in a 4-0 home shutout April 20. 

But it was his father’s aggressive managerial style on the basepaths that fueled explosions of five runs--more than half of them unearned--in the second and sixth innings before chasing junior Chino Valley starting pitcher JP Mcnerny and triggering the Arizona Interscholastic Association mercy rule.

“We’re not a power-hitting team,” said Howry after taking advantage of six Cougar errors in the two shutout wins. “We have speed. We try and get guys on, try and move guys and cause havoc, see what we can do.

“I mean, it’s high school baseball. You never know when balls are going to get thrown around the yard.”

Junior pitcher Dale Fry struck out 10 in the complete-game shutout of the Cougars, who won the West Region title over the Crusaders by tiebreaker in 2017 but were shut out by them in the first round of the 3A tournament en route to Northwest Christian’s first state title.

“Obviously, our pitcher did a great job,” Howry said. “He threw a great game. It’s huge for us to come out and actually shut them out twice this week.”

Both wins likely will flip the ninth-ranked Crusaders [8-5] and the seventh-ranked Cougars [12-4] in the AIA’s next power rankings. Despite a 1-5 start, Northwest Christian is two wins from a perfect April and has the inside track for a first-round home playoff game as one of the top eight finishers in the conference. 

“Even though we got off to a slow start, we seem to be coming together at the right time,” Howry said. “We’ll just continue to try to build on it.”

Juniors Matthew Olson and Andrew Richardson each scored twice, each also knocking in two additional runs for the Crusaders. 

But the greatest offensive contribution this season, Howry believes, has come from freshman Gunnar Penskover, who added two RBIs in each of the shutouts. 

“And he wasn’t even a starter out of the gate for us,” Howry said. “He started out as a backup center fielder.”

Prior to the third game of the season at Benjamin Franklin High School, however, the Crusaders’ regular shortstop was injured, giving Penzkover the opportunity to start at the position.

He got a hit in the 5-2 win, and from that March 18 game, a young star was born. Penskover leads the team in RBIs and likely the region in batting average.

“I think he’s hitting well over .500,” Howry said. “For us, that would be a bright spot we didn’t see coming.”