Nashua Silver Kniight Nate Kelleher-Mochak delivers a pitch during his five-inning scoreless stint vs. Westfield Wednesday night at Holman Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – The good news is the Nashua Silver Knights needed only one run to beat Westfield, 1-0, on Wednesday night at Holman Stadium.

The bad news is they’ll probably need more than that with Vermont coming to Holman tonight.

“Not if we pitch like we did today,” Silver Knights manager Nick Guarino, a former pitcher and current college pitching coach, said with a grin as the announced crowd of 826 began filing out, happy with what they watched.

He may be right. Just over a week ago, the Knight bats were red hot, but in the last few days, the pitchers are on fire with the staff providing two consecutive shutouts. After giving up two runs each in the sixth, seventh and eighth at New Britain on Sunday, the Knights have gone 18 straight scoreless.

“We went over all of it today with the guys upstairs doing the stats,” Guarino said. “We have a 70 percent first-pitch strike rate over the last week. That makes it easier to pitch when you’re up by one. … It’s getting ahead, that’s what it is. It’s not rocket science.”

The sad thing is that starter Nate Kelleher-Mochak saves his best for last, as he is wanted back at Springfield College to prep for a competitive fall season. He tossed five innings of four-hit ball, two strikeouts but to Guarino’s point – no walks. He even survived Westfield’s Evan Menzel being on third with one out in the first.

Rob Gilchrist tossed three innings of scoreless one-hit, one-walk relief, and local product Brandon Metevier needed just seven pitches and nice defensive play in the hole by shortstop Pat Shrake to close it out.

That’s efficiency, and now the Knights are 20-17.

“Hey, just go out and have fun, be loose, have some fun,” Guarino said. “Simple.”

The downside? Wins over 8-29 Wesfield shouldn’t be this difficult to solidify. The Knights managed just five hits against a struggling pitching staff and left 11 men on, including second and third in the eighth with one out. Westfield starter Greg Strite even tried to help, plunking four Silver Knights, but his off-speed pitch dropped off the table to the tune of eight strikeouts in 4.2 innings.

“I told them to just simplify it, dumb it down, make that guy a one-pitch guy, hunt the fastball,” Guarino said. “Let’s not get into bad habits chasing those pitches. ..; We tried to do too much.”

True, there were very few hitter’s counts for Nashua, but they got the only run of the game in the first when Anthony Grabau, back from a bad knee, singled with one out and Keldrin Rodriguez walked, Joey Current followed with a two-out RBI single. Who knew that when Grabau crossed the plate that would be it for the night?

But Nashua played defense too. Newcomer Keldrin Rodriguez, who was at first on Tuesday, was in left last night and ran down a fly ball that was behind him, facing the wall with the warning track about a foot away. Nashua also turned a nice 5-4-3 double play in the sixth.

“No errors,” Guarino said. “We’re playing great defense. We had one error yesterday, none today … We’re playing simple baseball. You know that, we’re not going to score 10 runs a game. Play defense, throw strikes, scratch out a run or two, and you can win a baseball game.”

And there’s that play that ended it to help give Metivier the save, but the Bishop Guertin alum was dealing.

“I think it’s the adrenalin,” Metivier said. “I think I’ve really settled into the closer role really well, I love being out there in tight games. Especially against Westfield, this was a must-win game.”

The Silver Knight arms have spoken.

Nashua infielder Anthony Grabau throws on to first to complete a 5-4-3 double play while Westfield baserunner Evan Menzel hopes for a different outcome during Wednesday night’s game at Holman Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

INURY UPDATES

Once again, infielder and leadoff hitter Ernie Little was still not in the lineup, as the team is waiting for test results on his back. There may be word on Friday, Guarino said. “As long as everything comes back clean, he says he feels pretty good, we’ll get him back in the cages again. Maybe he’s back for Sunday, maybe (next Tuesday) if he’s cleared.”…

Also hurt is first base-outfieler River Hart. He hasn’t played in a week and is suffering from turf toe from when he ran into the wall at Norwich a week ago. “He can’t put much weight on it,” Guarino said. “It could be two days, it could be seven days, you just don’t know. He’s taking it slow, we’ve got a lot of guys, no need to rush him back, it’d be kind of dumb to do that. I’d rather have him healthy in two weeks.”…

PITCHING PLANS

The pitching for the next three games: Brennan Rumpf gets his first start of the season tonight vs. the Lake Monsters here (Nashua ETV), then Matt Fitzgibbon makes his final Silver Knights start Friday at New Britain, and Andrew Chenevert takes his regular turn Saturday at Westfield.

MAJOR LEAGUE ALUM

Another Silver Knight/FCBL alum has made it to the Majors, and in this case, made an immediate impact. You may not remember former Silver Knight Cam Schlitter, as he made just three fairly forgettable appearances for Nashua in 2019 as an incoming Northeastern freshman.

Well, last night in the Bronx, Schlitter made his MLB debut for the Yankees, getting the win 9-6 over the Seattle Mariners. He went 5.1 innings, allowing three earned runs on four hits, walking two but striking out seven. His fastball according to the YES Network averaged 98 mph and he topped out at 100.

Now that’s a far cry from his three relief appearances with the Knights, as he allowed a total of three earned runs on six hits in just 2.1 innings, one walk and four strikeouts.

“It’s unbelievable,” Silver Knights GM Cam Cook, who was the assistant GM/Stadium operations manager then. “2019 seems like a long time ago, but he was young with us. It’s always funny when those guys come, whether they’re here for three games or 55 games. … You get a blast from the past and this guy is wearing a big league uniform. That’s the point of this league – you’re seeing guys before they’re guys.”