Photo by Mike Morrison Frontier’s Lucas Cox (1) makes contact during a high school baseball district semifinal game against Hiland Tuesday at Don Coss Field in Cambridge, Ohio. Hiland won, 11-1.

CAMBRIDGE — Berlin Hiland didn’t collect a single extra base hit in Tuesday evening’s Division IV district semifinal at Don Coss Field but the Hawks played small ball to perfection as they banged out 11 singles en route to an 11-1 win over the Frontier Cougars.

The top-seeded Hawks took advantage of some uncharacteristically poor Frontier defense to score six times in the first two innings and they never looked back as they punched their ticket to Thursday evening’s district final at Minerva against Toronto.

“We haven’t made but a handful of errors in the last 10 games and we made five in the first two innings tonight and that just killed us,” said Frontier head coach Kurt Satterfield. “They are a great team and you just can’t make that many mistakes against a great team and expect to win.”

The Hawks plated a pair of unearned runs in the opening inning and after starting pitcher Nolan Yoder retired the Cougars in order in the top of the second for the second consecutive inning, Hiland added four more in the bottom of the inning.

With one out Isaac Yoder singled and moved to second when Tony Yoder worked Frontier starting pitcher J.D. Schmidt for a base on balls.

Second baseman Grant Miller plated the first run with a solid hit up the middle and Cody Yoder’s sacrifice fly made it 4-0.

Nolan Yoder followed with his second RBI hit in as many innings before a Cougar defensive error allowed yet another Hiland run to cross the plate to push the lead to 6-0.

Frontier looked like they might come to life in the top of the third when Austin Holdren and Rylee Childers collected back-to-back knocks off of Nolan Yoder to open the inning.

Holdren came around to score on infield ground outs by Nathan Bowersock and Lucas Cox but that would prove to be the only run and the only hits of the game for the Cougars.

The Hawks added two more insurance runs in the bottom of the third on a sacrifice fly by Isaac Yoder and an RBI single by Tony Yoder.

While everyone was getting in on the act offensively for the Hawks, Nolan Yoder was excellent on the bump.

Yoder allowed just the two base hits and did not walk a batter while striking out three for the winners.

Berlin Hiland put an exclamation point on the win when they scored three times in the fourth to push their lead to 10.

Consecutive hits by Jeff Todaro, Alec Weaver and Dakota Miller off of relief pitcher Noah West loaded the bases and after Will Schlabach was hit by a pitch to plate the ninth run Isaac Yoder knocked in the final two with a two-run hit to center.

Nolan Yoder set down the Cougars in order in the top of the fifth for the third time in the game to seal the deal as the Hawks improved to 12-5-1 on the season.

While the loss was a disappointing one for the Cougars it certainly won’t dampen what was a great season that included a Sectional championship and an outstanding 15-6 record.

“Our kids don’t have any reason to hang their heads because they had a great season and won a sectional which is like winning the World Series for us,” said Satterfield, whose team also captured an elusive victory over arch-rival Fort Frye this season.

The game marked the final one for six Cougar seniors including Schmidt, Holdren, Karter Satterfield, Nate Bowersock, Slade Amos and Gavin Mendenhall.

“I’m so proud of all of our kids especially those six seniors,” said Satterfield. “They gave us everything they had and hopefully these other kids will learn from their example and we can get back here again next year.”