Softball: Fremd holds off Prospect, maintains 2-game MSL East lead
On a beautiful late afternoon, a nice crowd on both sides of the Prospect softball diamond gathered for Wednesday's MId-Suburban League crossover game.
The Daily Herald's top-ranked Fremd Vikings came to Mt. Prospect looking to maintain their two-game lead in the MId-Suburban West.
The Vikings (16-2, 10-0) did exactly that but not before needing every ounce of energy it could find to hold off a pesky Knights squad (10-9, 5-5) that has been playing its best softball in the MSL East.
The home team had the tying run -- Gabby Dilan who had singled to left -- on second base with one out in the bottom of the seventh when Fremd ace Hailey Lucas got back-to-back called third strikes on two of the host's most dangerous hitters.
The junior right-hander (14-2), who was locked in a nifty pitchers’ duel with Prospect sophomore Lina Calvacca, finished with 13 strikeouts and a 4-3 win.
She reached 197 strikeouts in 103 innings of work this spring.
But it was the Vikings' defense she couldn't wait to discuss.
"My defense did it," Lucas said. "We had the incredible catch in left and the amazing catch in right field," Lucas said. "Those really helped me out. And Avery Sadorf really charged in on a ball to make a tough play. The defense really came up clutch."
Lucas was describing Kiana Matsunaga running hard into foul territory to rob Maeve Johl in the sixth inning, and Josie Weber running in on a spinning fly ball to rob Calvacca.
Lucas also went 2-for-4 at the plate with an RBI.
"In a lot of ways Hailey reflects what this team is," said Fremd coach Josh Teschner. "If we are going to have to fight through adversity in tight games, Hailey helps set that tone for us. But there is a dugout full of girls who had her back in doing that."
Lucas' RBI single to center scored Taylor Piento in the first inning for a 1-0 lead. Courtesy runner Alexa Pazur crossed the plate on an error for a second run.
The Vikes nudged ahead 3-0 in the third on Weber's RBI groundout that scored Pazur again.
Prospect countered with a pair of runs in the bottom of the third.
Kate Kulak led off with a single to center and went to second on Gabby Dilan's sacrifice bunt. Dilan scored on Gina Falls' one-out line drive single to right. Falls then came home on Rachael Sasanuma's infield single to make it 3-2.
Fremd scored its final run in the top of the fourth when Avery Sheridan singled and came home on Amanda Poniecki's sacrifice fly to right.
Prospect got to within 4-3 in the bottom of the fifth when Falls drilled a line drive double to right center scoring Dilan, who had singled to right with one out.
"I feel like we were always down a run or two but we kept coming back," said Dilan, the Knights second baseman who made some nifty defensive plays, including a diving stop to her right to rob Matsunaga in the sixth inning.
"We stayed in the game and like our coach (Krystina Mackowiak) said, we should be proud because we played with the top-ranked team in the area. Now, we've got to get ready for Barrington (Thursday)."
Teschner said his team must always be ready for its opponents.
"We know we are getting everyone's best punch," he said. "And for us to win against a team like Prospect shows we can overcome adversity, Because we are playing a very well-coached team and a great offensive team, as this game got closer we had to battle together and Hailey set the tone."
"They (Prospect) are a very good team with a bunch of good hitters and they fought hard," Lucas said. "We were able to battle and get some runs when we needed them so that was great."
Piento (2-for-3) and Avery Sheridan (2-for-3) were also multiple hitters for Fremd while Dilan, Sasanuma and Falls each had 2 hits for Prospect.
"It was a very good game," Mackowiak said. "I'm very proud of Lina (Calvacca). She did everything she could to help us. And we made some phenomenal plays on defense.“
Those plays included third baseman Johl making two diving catches to her left to rob Poniecki in the sixth and Leah Sheehan in the seventh.
"We took away some innings from them that could have been very big and that's what kept us in it,“ Mackowiak said. ”We just didn't capitalize enough when we had runners on base. But I'm very proud of how this team played."