Completed Event: Baseball at Stanford on May 9, 2025 , Win , 4, to, 3
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Photo by: Bryce Wheeler
Mattison no-hitter marvels for memories
4/1/2024 11:45:00 AM | Baseball, Paul Coro, Lopes Insider Blog
Freshman became 1st Lopes pitcher to hold oppponent hitless since 1982
After a series-opening loss Thursday night, Grand Canyon's Friday night starting pitcher Connor Mattison sent his head coach, Gregg Wallis, a reassuring text message:
Don't worry, I got you tomorrow. Let's get the win.
And then some.
After chasing history for a masterful two hours, Mattison ended the first Lopes no-hitter in 42 years being chased by teammates into GCU Ballpark's center field, where a car wash of arms hugging him and bottles flinging water at him celebrated more than a 4-0 win against Sacramento State.
When Mattison settled in for an ESPN+ postgame interview, Lopes senior pitchers Shawn Triplett and Nathan Ward dumped a cooler of water over the red-hot hurler after senior second baseman Dustin Crenshaw spread dirt over him.
"The coolest thing is to be part of something that hasn't happened in so long," said Mattison, whose parents, two siblings and grandparents were in attendance. "It's pretty special. I've never seen my mom and dad more ecstatic for anything. It makes me feel better than ever."
The indelible piece of pitching art took 125 strokes from his electric right arm, stymieing and stupefying Sacramento State players into not being hitters for a night. It earned Mattison national Pitcher of the Week honors from D1Baseball and Perfect Game and WAC Pitcher of the Week.
Exactly five weeks after an Opening Night save for his scintillating debut, Mattison prompted Keith Baker to move from following the game's live stats with his wife, Amber, on an iPad to watching the final three innings on the television in hopes he would lose his longest-held Lopes baseball distinction – the program's last no-hitter on March 11, 1982, against Nebraska Wesleyan. Baker's no-hitter came when the senior long reliever received his first start on his third NAIA national championship team.
"A no-hitter isn't necessarily dependent on a pitcher, but watching Connor, he had control of everything going on," said Baker, a former 20-year GCU athletic director whose no-hitter came within a month of a previous no-hitter. "I feel great for Connor, and that he is getting to experience that. It's a record that can never be broken.
"I was very impressed that he kept a seemingly calm demeanor. He's got a lot more capacity to pitch than I did."
The game was a culmination of a seven-start stretch in which GCU pitching coach Nathan Bannister switched Mattison from a four-seam fastball to a two-seam fastball while also introducing a slider to complement the devastating change-up that he could lean on more exclusively at nearby Canyon View High School last year.
Pitch No. 125 was a sweeping slider, Baker's go-to pitch for his no-hitter, that induced a first-pitch pop-up into foul territory for senior catcher Alton Gyselman to catch. Junior third baseman Eli Paton already had thrust his arms into the air before the catch, when Mattison launched his purple-laced high-tops airborne in his joy and took an airborne chest bump from junior first baseman Beau Ankeney.
Coming off his worst bullpen day of the season, Mattison began the best night of his baseball life ominously with a one-out walk and hit batsman in the first inning.
The auspicious start quickly flipped into awesome pitching. When he went to a 2-0 count with two on and one out in the first inning, Bannister was two steps out of the dugout when he noticed Paton, the team leader, and Gyselman heading to the mound. The ball had been slipping in Mattison's hand, but he said his teammates' words calmed and refocused him.
"It was a good spot to slow him down and give him a breather," Bannister said. "That was tremendous timing by them."
Mattison's hat flew off on his next pitch, as it often does when he throws his low-90 mph fastball. At a full count, Mattison challenged inside and a shot was sent inside third base, where Paton back-handed the rocket, stepped on third and threw to first to squash the threat – Mattison's last one.
"Once I got out of that inning with no runs, I was thinking I could start over and put the game away," Mattison said.
Between hit batsman, Mattison recorded 15 consecutive outs – the first seven of which were strikeouts or infield outs. A 15-minute, two-run Lopes first inning helped Mattison reset in the dugout. His energy often carries over to pacing, chatty restlessness in the dugout, where pitchers Daniel Avitia and Carter Young made him sit down for the first two outs of each inning when the Lopes were batting.
The 6-foot-2 right-hander's first four strikeouts were in the dirt, signifying the preposterous deception of a change-up that Mattison throws with no altered body movement or arm speed.
"It looks like a fastball coming out," Bannister said. "He doesn't slow down or telegraph it. That's really deceptive on the hitters.
"It looks like it's dropping 15 feet in front of the plate. It almost stops and goes down. For most of the path, it stays on a true line and then it's like he pulls the string."
Mattison brought batters literally to their knees while whiffing, and his pitch placement jammed others. When the fourth inning ended with a waist-high strikeout, Mattison yelled, "Let's go!" and side-skipped to a dugout where he remained restless, per usual.
"OK, they have no hits," Mattison said he thought before checking himself of how far away a no-hitter laid.
The masterpiece required more Paton gems – a diving play toward third base in the fifth inning with a perfect throw to first and fielding an ideal bunt bare-handed on the charge from behind third base with another ideal throw.
"The only thing I keep thinking about is, if it wasn't for Eli playing third base like he did, that moment and that memory wouldn't have happened for me," Mattison said. "Insane. Three times on balls that I thought for sure were going to be hits."
GCU reliever Nathan Ward began throwing in the bullpen in the seventh inning, but Mattison ended it with a strikeout that matched the 104 pitches he had thrown six days earlier in his best previous outing – six innings with one run allowed at UT Rio Grande Valley. The debut of his two-seam fastball induced six swing-and-miss strikeouts with his velocity remaining in the low 90s.
"After the seventh, I was like, 'Oh, dude, I can do this for sure,' " Mattison said. "But no one on my team said anything to me about it the whole time."
In sophomore shortstop Emilio Barreras' case, it was because he was oblivious until the team charged out of the dugout to celebrate.
"I was just so lost, and I looked behind me (at the left-field scoreboard) and I see no hits," said Barreras, who made a back-handed play on a second-inning grounder in the hole.
Friday night's season-high 10 strikeouts normally would spike the pitch count, but six of the strikeouts only required three or four pitches. After his four-seam fastball was being hit early in the season, the two-seam fastball drops 4 inches to be particularly rough on left-handed hitters when it travels down and away.
Mattison was unflappable, walking off the mound smiling after ending the eighth inning with a pop-up. He was leery of having to face the top of the Hornets' order for the fourth time in the ninth inning. Even with two walks and two hit batsman, Mattison worked quickly all night and usually was ready before the batter. But when it came time to start the ninth, he took a deep breath to center himself and then needed only seven pitches to polish off a gem.
For the 26th out, Mattison waited out a Hornet hitter's 30-second delay to spit in his batting gloves and repeatedly wipe an eye.
"Once I saw him get something in his eye or whatever it was, I knew he was out," Mattison said. "It gave me more confidence."
Six days after throwing a season-high 104 pitches, Wallis and Bannister quietly met in the corner of the dugout with an accord to let Mattison chase history.
"Connor's a joy to be around," Bannister said. "He's really competitive. For as competitive as he is in the moment, he just wants to be part of the guys.
"The work that nobody sees is coming to light, and that's the cool part to see for Connor."
Don't worry, I got you tomorrow. Let's get the win.
And then some.After chasing history for a masterful two hours, Mattison ended the first Lopes no-hitter in 42 years being chased by teammates into GCU Ballpark's center field, where a car wash of arms hugging him and bottles flinging water at him celebrated more than a 4-0 win against Sacramento State.
When Mattison settled in for an ESPN+ postgame interview, Lopes senior pitchers Shawn Triplett and Nathan Ward dumped a cooler of water over the red-hot hurler after senior second baseman Dustin Crenshaw spread dirt over him.
"The coolest thing is to be part of something that hasn't happened in so long," said Mattison, whose parents, two siblings and grandparents were in attendance. "It's pretty special. I've never seen my mom and dad more ecstatic for anything. It makes me feel better than ever."
The indelible piece of pitching art took 125 strokes from his electric right arm, stymieing and stupefying Sacramento State players into not being hitters for a night. It earned Mattison national Pitcher of the Week honors from D1Baseball and Perfect Game and WAC Pitcher of the Week.
Exactly five weeks after an Opening Night save for his scintillating debut, Mattison prompted Keith Baker to move from following the game's live stats with his wife, Amber, on an iPad to watching the final three innings on the television in hopes he would lose his longest-held Lopes baseball distinction – the program's last no-hitter on March 11, 1982, against Nebraska Wesleyan. Baker's no-hitter came when the senior long reliever received his first start on his third NAIA national championship team.
"A no-hitter isn't necessarily dependent on a pitcher, but watching Connor, he had control of everything going on," said Baker, a former 20-year GCU athletic director whose no-hitter came within a month of a previous no-hitter. "I feel great for Connor, and that he is getting to experience that. It's a record that can never be broken.
"I was very impressed that he kept a seemingly calm demeanor. He's got a lot more capacity to pitch than I did."
The game was a culmination of a seven-start stretch in which GCU pitching coach Nathan Bannister switched Mattison from a four-seam fastball to a two-seam fastball while also introducing a slider to complement the devastating change-up that he could lean on more exclusively at nearby Canyon View High School last year.
Pitch No. 125 was a sweeping slider, Baker's go-to pitch for his no-hitter, that induced a first-pitch pop-up into foul territory for senior catcher Alton Gyselman to catch. Junior third baseman Eli Paton already had thrust his arms into the air before the catch, when Mattison launched his purple-laced high-tops airborne in his joy and took an airborne chest bump from junior first baseman Beau Ankeney.Coming off his worst bullpen day of the season, Mattison began the best night of his baseball life ominously with a one-out walk and hit batsman in the first inning.
The auspicious start quickly flipped into awesome pitching. When he went to a 2-0 count with two on and one out in the first inning, Bannister was two steps out of the dugout when he noticed Paton, the team leader, and Gyselman heading to the mound. The ball had been slipping in Mattison's hand, but he said his teammates' words calmed and refocused him.
"It was a good spot to slow him down and give him a breather," Bannister said. "That was tremendous timing by them."
Mattison's hat flew off on his next pitch, as it often does when he throws his low-90 mph fastball. At a full count, Mattison challenged inside and a shot was sent inside third base, where Paton back-handed the rocket, stepped on third and threw to first to squash the threat – Mattison's last one.
"Once I got out of that inning with no runs, I was thinking I could start over and put the game away," Mattison said.
Between hit batsman, Mattison recorded 15 consecutive outs – the first seven of which were strikeouts or infield outs. A 15-minute, two-run Lopes first inning helped Mattison reset in the dugout. His energy often carries over to pacing, chatty restlessness in the dugout, where pitchers Daniel Avitia and Carter Young made him sit down for the first two outs of each inning when the Lopes were batting.The 6-foot-2 right-hander's first four strikeouts were in the dirt, signifying the preposterous deception of a change-up that Mattison throws with no altered body movement or arm speed.
"It looks like a fastball coming out," Bannister said. "He doesn't slow down or telegraph it. That's really deceptive on the hitters.
"It looks like it's dropping 15 feet in front of the plate. It almost stops and goes down. For most of the path, it stays on a true line and then it's like he pulls the string."
Mattison brought batters literally to their knees while whiffing, and his pitch placement jammed others. When the fourth inning ended with a waist-high strikeout, Mattison yelled, "Let's go!" and side-skipped to a dugout where he remained restless, per usual.
"OK, they have no hits," Mattison said he thought before checking himself of how far away a no-hitter laid.
The masterpiece required more Paton gems – a diving play toward third base in the fifth inning with a perfect throw to first and fielding an ideal bunt bare-handed on the charge from behind third base with another ideal throw.
"The only thing I keep thinking about is, if it wasn't for Eli playing third base like he did, that moment and that memory wouldn't have happened for me," Mattison said. "Insane. Three times on balls that I thought for sure were going to be hits."
GCU reliever Nathan Ward began throwing in the bullpen in the seventh inning, but Mattison ended it with a strikeout that matched the 104 pitches he had thrown six days earlier in his best previous outing – six innings with one run allowed at UT Rio Grande Valley. The debut of his two-seam fastball induced six swing-and-miss strikeouts with his velocity remaining in the low 90s.
"After the seventh, I was like, 'Oh, dude, I can do this for sure,' " Mattison said. "But no one on my team said anything to me about it the whole time."
In sophomore shortstop Emilio Barreras' case, it was because he was oblivious until the team charged out of the dugout to celebrate.
"I was just so lost, and I looked behind me (at the left-field scoreboard) and I see no hits," said Barreras, who made a back-handed play on a second-inning grounder in the hole.
Friday night's season-high 10 strikeouts normally would spike the pitch count, but six of the strikeouts only required three or four pitches. After his four-seam fastball was being hit early in the season, the two-seam fastball drops 4 inches to be particularly rough on left-handed hitters when it travels down and away.
Mattison was unflappable, walking off the mound smiling after ending the eighth inning with a pop-up. He was leery of having to face the top of the Hornets' order for the fourth time in the ninth inning. Even with two walks and two hit batsman, Mattison worked quickly all night and usually was ready before the batter. But when it came time to start the ninth, he took a deep breath to center himself and then needed only seven pitches to polish off a gem.For the 26th out, Mattison waited out a Hornet hitter's 30-second delay to spit in his batting gloves and repeatedly wipe an eye.
"Once I saw him get something in his eye or whatever it was, I knew he was out," Mattison said. "It gave me more confidence."
Six days after throwing a season-high 104 pitches, Wallis and Bannister quietly met in the corner of the dugout with an accord to let Mattison chase history.
"Connor's a joy to be around," Bannister said. "He's really competitive. For as competitive as he is in the moment, he just wants to be part of the guys.
"The work that nobody sees is coming to light, and that's the cool part to see for Connor."
27 outs without a hit. 🤯
— Grand Canyon Baseball (@GCU_Baseball) March 30, 2024
Friday night history at Brazell Field.@ConnorMattison2 | #LopesUp pic.twitter.com/yAXmC5m498
🏆 𝐃𝟏𝐁𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐛𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐏𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤 🏆
— D1Baseball (@d1baseball) April 1, 2024
Connor Mattison | @GCU_Baseball
9 IP
0 R
0 H
2 BB
10 K pic.twitter.com/EGamshoXyU
𝐏𝐆 𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐂𝐨-𝐏𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐖𝐞𝐞𝐤 - 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐨𝐫 𝐌𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐧
— Perfect Game USA (@PerfectGameUSA) April 1, 2024
On Friday vs. Sacramento State, Mattison threw a NO HITTER on 125 pitches that included no runs, 2 walks and 10 Ks! 🔥 #LopesUp
Full write up: https://t.co/RwPe1FbHF7 pic.twitter.com/8M4nQ5x45b
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