Softball: St. Charles North wins; Bumbales steps down at Elgin
During the course of the regular season, St. Charles North's softball team swept Elgin by scores of 12-0 and 10-0 behind pitchers Maddie Webb and Natalie Walters.
The North Stars sent another pitcher to the mound with the last name that begins with a W during Tuesday's Class 4A regional semifinal clash with Elgin.
The results were similar - another 'W' for the North Stars.
Sophomore Jillian Waslawski (10-3) tossed a 2-hit complete game during the top-seeded North Stars' 9-0 victory over the 16th-seeded Maroons in St. Charles.
The North Stars (23-5) will take on the winner of Wednesday's game between Lake Park and South Elgin at 11 a.m. on Saturday for the regional title.
"I thought that Jill hit her stride there around the middle of the second inning," North Stars coach Tom Poulin said of Waslawski, who retired 21 of the final 22 batters she faced after allowing a leadoff single to Rachel Turner and a walk to Lexi Ruiz in the top of the first inning.
"It was a little shaky the first two batters," said Waslawski. "I was kind of just getting my feel back. After that, I knew my team was behind me and I knew we could do what we wanted to do."
Waslawski worked out of the early jam, striking out two of the last three batters sandwiched around a soft liner speared by second baseman Samantha Vaca.
St. Charles North grabbed a 1-0 lead in the first as Jordyn Wolfe led off with a bunt single, stole second and advanced to third before scoring on an infield fly off the bat of Amanda James.
Wolfe, who finished 3 for 4 and scored 3 runs, added bunt singles in the fifth and sixth innings when the North Stars pulled away.
"You get her on, we like our chances of pushing one (run) across," said Poulin.
The North Stars added unearned runs in the second and fourth against Elgin senior pitcher Jessica Rago, who fired a no-hitter with 15 strikeouts and no walks during the Maroons' 4-1 regional quarterfinal win over Addison Trail on Monday.
Ashlyn Jozefowicz's RBI triple highlighted a 2-run fifth before the North Stars broke the game open with a 4-run sixth that included RBI singles from Allison Hausl, Wolfe and James.
"We came out a little sluggish at the start but I thought we had productive outs there toward the end," said Poulin. "We did what we needed to do to go 1-0 today. We'll need to do a better job Saturday."
Wisconsin Lutheran-bound Rago fanned 4 and added a single for the Maroons.
"She threw really well coming off a no-hitter (Monday)," said Elgin's Dr. Nick Bumbales, who coached his final softball game (he will continue as the head girls basketball coach).
"This group has been really positive. Expectations individually I think have been met or exceeded. The wins might not necessarily be there but we beat Larkin twice, which is always a team goal. We wanted to compete in the tournament here and I thought we did."