'Big-time' Beau Alazaus pitches West Branch High School baseball into OHSAA district final

LOUISVILLE — “Beau knows baseball."

West Branch High School’s 6-6 star senior pitcher Beau Alazaus pitched a one-hitter in leading the Warriors to a 1-0 Division II district semifinal baseball win over ND-CL at Louisville’s Field of Dreams on Monday evening.

“Beau knows baseball,” smiled West Branch head coach Rick Mulinix. “Beau in his last two district semifinal games has over a dozen strikeouts with no walks and two hits. We call him big-time Beau for a reason. When Beau’s on the mound, we’ve got a chance to win.”

Alazaus, an All-Ohioan in baseball and football, was masterful on the mound. He earned his eighth win in nine outings this season, pitching a complete game.

“It’s always awesome to come out on top and move on to the next round,” said Alazaus after his latest masterpiece.

“I felt really good from the start today, and obviously my defense played great behind me. They all made plays which helps a lot.”

Alazaus kept Lion batters off-balanced all evening, using a variety of off-speed pitches with his effective fastball. He struck out seven and walked none.

“He had a two-pitch mix and even when he got behind, you could see he was still throwing an off-speed pitch for a strike,” ND-CL head coach Marc Thibeault said.

Alazaus, who threw for over 3,000 yards as the Warriors’ football quarterback this past fall and had football offers to play at schools such as Lake Erie College, decided that he would continue his first love at the college level, and that’s playing baseball. He is a Walsh University baseball commit.

“There was a month or two where I was thinking about which one I wanted to play in college but baseball is what I want to do,” said Alazaus who has under a 1.00 ERA this season.

He is the son of Shawn Alazaus, who was drafted and played in the New York Yankees’ farm system.

Beau Alazaus was in a scoreless, low-scoring pitching affair with ND-CL left-hander Braeden Kinnaird through the first 4 1/2 frames Monday.

But all that changed in the bottom of the fifth with the Warriors at bat. West Branch’s Boston Mulinix was the star of the game offensively for the Warriors with his RBI double in the fifth to score Jaxon Robb with what turned out to be the winning run.

Offensively for West Branch (22-6), Hunter Shields had a double and a single to go along with the RBI double from Mulinix. West Branch registered six hits in the game as Robb, Anthony Perry and Aaron Tucker added solo hits.

Alazaus, who seemingly got stronger as the game progressed, talked of his pitching strategy on the mound.

“I just build momentum and get a feel for what (the other team’s) weaknesses are,” he explained. “With the tough schedule we’ve played, it’s really helped us get here.”

Alazaus loves the fact he is also part of a team that set the all-time West Branch win record for a season with their 22nd victory.

"That’s exciting, there’s no group of guys I’d rather do that (set the school record for wins) than the guys behind me,” he smiled. “That’s awesome.”

West Branch will go up against the Geneva Eagles in the Division II district final at 5 p.m. Wednesday, at Louisville’s Field of Dreams.

This article originally appeared on The Repository: West Branch High School baseball reaches OHSAA district final