St. Francis bolts past St. Edward
Over the past few years, the St. Francis softball team has had its share of struggles with St. Edward senior pitcher Sarah Field.
Not on Wednesday, though.
The Spartans pounded out 14 hits and took full advantage of 8 St. Edward errors in beating the Green Wave 8-3 in the Suburban Christian Blue opener for both teams at the Elgin Sports Complex.
“Sarah’s a good pitcher and we’ve struggled against her in the past,” St. Francis coach Ralph Remus said. “It was nice to come out and hit the ball that well against her.”
One Spartan in particular did a ton of damage to the Wave’s hopes of winning their first game of the season, Junior catcher Blaine Carragher was 4-for-5 with a home run, a double and 2 RBI.
“It was a good day for me,” Carragher smiled. “Everyone was really hitting today. We knew what she was throwing so we moved up on the plate for the outside pitch. Everyone came in with a good mindset to hit today.”
The Spartans (4-2, 1-0) jumped ahead 2-0 in the first inning when a St. Edward throwing error allowed both runs to score. Paige Davis beat out an infield hit to lead off the inning, Brie Pasquale (2-for-4) ripped a one-out single and Emily Karpinski walked to load the bases. St. Edward then had a chance for a force play at home on Laura Behnke’s grounder but the throw went wide of senior catcher Tarah McShane and then ricocheted off the backstop, allowing both Davis and Pasquale to score.
Winning pitcher Taylor Ronchetto doubled to lead off the second, went to third on a Carragher single and scored on Pasquale’s grounder to make it 3-0. Carragher’s two-out solo homer made it 4-0 in the top of the fourth and the Spartans added a run in the inning when Pasquale followed the home run with a double and scored later on another St. Edward throwing error.
“I thought Sarah pitched pretty well today but their errors really hurt them,” said Remus of the Green Wave.
St. Edward (0-5, 0-1) finally broke the ice in the bottom of the fourth when McShane singled and Field doubled to put runners on second and third. McShane scored on Julie Larson’s groundout and Field came home on a sacrifice fly from Veronica Rolando. McShane hit a solo homer in the sixth for the Green Wave’s other run.
St. Francis added single runs in the fifth, sixth and seventh innings as Carragher drove in Danielle Vitagliano in the fifth, Behnke scored on an error in the sixth and Pasquale scored on another error in the seventh.
“We didn’t play defense,” said St. Edward coach Jaci Corn. “Right now we’re really struggling defensively and we need to change that if we’re going to win games.”
The Wave only got 5 hits off Ronchetto and the 5-9 batters in the St. Edward lineup were a combined 0-for-13. Ronchetto struck out six and didn’t walk a batter and the Spartans played flawlessly on defense.
“The last four games we haven’t made an error,” Remus said. “That’s what I’m looking for. It all starts with defense.”
Field struck out six and walked four and allowed only 3 earned runs for St. Edward. She also had 2 hits.