Ashton Stern’s lights-out efforts lift Johnsburg to fast start

JOHNSBURG – Matchups matter.

Longtime Johnsburg boys basketball assistant coach Eric Toussaint may be in his first season as the Skyhawks’ head baseball coach, but he’s been finding different, if not unique, ways to strategize when choosing his starting pitcher. Whether pitching matchups on the diamond or matchup zones on the basketball court, game-planning can pay off.

Toussaint started lefty Evan Pohl against Marian Central on March 25, fully aware that the senior started on the mound against the Hurricanes last year in a play-in game of the Class 2A Richmond-Burton Regional, which Marian won 2-1.

In the rematch, Pohl struck out 10 in 6⅔ innings and got the win in a 1-0 final.

The next night, Toussaint gave the ball to junior right-hander Ashton Stern, fully aware that the opponent, Winnebago, knocked Johnsburg out of the Class 2A basketball tournament in a semifinal of the Rockford Christian Regional in late February. The 6-foot-3 Stern was a starting guard on the basketball team for coach Mike Toussaint, Eric’s brother.

“It left a bad taste in my mouth, having our season end pretty early,” Stern said.

All Stern did against Winnebago on March 26 was allow zero hits, while striking out 14 in six shutout innings under Johnsburg’s new lights. He walked four, but struck out the side in the fifth and sixth. Peyton Mesce finished off the no-hitter, recording two strikeouts in the seventh, as Johnsburg won 3-0 to improve to 4-2.

Stern (1-0) even had two hits in an effort that was lights out, so to speak.

“He’s just a competitive kid,” Toussaint said. “When I told him, ‘You’re going to take Winnebago,’ he was like, ‘Yep, let me do it.’ ”

It was Stern’s second start of the season. He threw six innings of one-run ball with seven strikeouts and one walk against Jacobs on March 18. Against Winnebago, on a night with temperatures in the 40s, he relied on a fastball, a curveball, which he said he threw “probably 40% of the time,” and an occasional changeup.

“It was just all fluid momentum,” Stern said. “I was the aggressor tonight. I just kept getting ahead [in the count]. I know it’s cold, hitters don’t want to hit, so I knew it was my time to attack.”

Stern, a three-sport athlete who plays shortstop or third base when not pitching, is one of the Skyhawks’ returning players.

“I didn’t have the greatest season [in baseball last year],” Stern said. “I was kind of all over the place, but this offseason I picked it up. I was in the gym most of the time, picking up velocity and just throwing the ball more often, and that was something I didn’t do my earlier years.”

Stern participated in golf last fall for the Skyhawks and shot in the mid-40s for nine holes. He played football his freshman and sophomore years.

“It worked out well because I got more time in the gym for basketball,” said Stern, whose hoops season included back-to-back games of 17 and 15 points against 22-win Richmond-Burton and Kishwaukee River Conference champion Sandwich, respectively. “I improved my shot and just had more free time.”

As the shooter Stern has shown early this spring, he can hit a different kind of target – the strike zone. Johnsburg no-hitters haven’t been the norm in recent years.

“I thought it was great,” Stern said. “I was having so much fun.”

Better with Linkletter: Heading into Monday night’s game against visiting Aurora Central Catholic, Johnsburg’s pitchers had a 1.79 ERA with 57 strikeouts in 39 innings, and opponents were hitting .174.

Toussaint credits new assistant coach and 2019 Johnsburg alumnus Ryan Linkletter, who’s a recent graduate of Northern Illinois, where he pitched.

“He’s in charge of everything,” Toussaint said. “He’s treating it like a college program. He is calling pitches, and he is telling us what’s going to happen before the pitch. He is ahead of the game. For a young kid in his first year, he is phenomenal. I am blessed to have him.”

Cheesy promotion: Johnsburg’s concession stand features a fun treat: nachos served in a full-size, plastic Johnsburg batting helmet.

The ballpark enjoyment also includes walk-up music for every Skyhawks hitter.

“I just want to have a fun environment,” Toussaint said. “The baseball program has been down for so long. I see when our football team does well how the community comes out, and the kids are happy. I see in basketball when we do well the community comes out, and the kids are happy. Why can’t we do that for baseball? The [new] lights are awesome. The [new] turf’s awesome.”

The product on the field has been good, too. The Skyhawks are only two wins shy of matching last year’s total of six. They won five games in 2023.

“The kids are having a blast,” Toussaint said.