GRAND CHUTE – Bloomer pitcher Trevor Morning admitted after Wednesday night’s WIAA Division 2 state semifinal he was a bit nervous about how he would perform on the mound at Time Warner Cable Field at Fox Cities Stadium.

All of those nerves seemed to just go away once Morning took the mound, striking out eight and allowing just one hit as the Blackhawks bats filled in the blanks in a 13-0 victory over Lakeside Lutheran.

“It was a big game,” Morning said about why he was nervous. “We’ve only been down here one time and we lost so I wanted to make my teammates happy and win and I got it done.”

The win gives Bloomer (27-3) a shot at the WIAA Division 2 title Thursday afternoon against the winner of the Madison Edgewood or Fox Valley Lutheran in Wednesday’s nightcap.

Morning pitched six innings and faced just two over the minimum. The lone hit he gave up came off the bat of Cole Strohbusch in the second inning. It was a pitch that went right back through the box and zipped past Morning.

“I though was going to take it, but I went for it and then was like ‘Oh no,’” Morning said before admitting the ball almost hit him near his right clavicle.

He seemed to have everything working for him after that, retiring the last 11 batters he faced and doing so with 12 pitches over two of those innings.

“Calming his neves has been one of Trevor’s biggest issues,” Bloomer coach A.J. Gehrmann said. “In the first three innings we had him at 55 pitches, then we had him at 12 pitches over the next two innings. So they got a little more aggressive and that played a little more into his favor.

“He was just pitching to his defense trying to get some early contact.”

Once he was dialed in, the offense took over, with the bottom of the order setting the table for the top of the order, as the bottom three spots in the order plated seven of the 13 runs.

Josh Schemenauer was one of two Blackhawks players to have four hits (Matt Dachel was the other going 4 for 5), going 4 for 4 with two doubles.

“We’re not completely shocked he had a game like that,” Gehrmann said of Schemenauer. “The bottom part of our order really picked us up and had some huge nights all around.”

With that complete game, and all but two of the starters getting hits Gehrmann was no doubt happy with what he saw and excited about advancing to play Thursday.

“We picked a great night to play our best game of the year,” Gehrmann said. “We just played a complete game.”

FULL GAME STATS