Glenbard South reloads with win over Naperville North

Glenbard South softball coach Julie Fonda had good reason to move her team’s game with Naperville North up a week to Wednesday.

The May-like temperatures, obviously. And her Raiders look in midseason form, too.

Glenbard South shook off a couple first-inning hiccups to beat Naperville North 8-2 in the season opener for both teams in Glen Ellyn.

The Raiders return seven starters off a team that took third in Class 3A last year, and they already had seven days of outdoor practices under their belt.

It showed.

“Obviously, this is not the weather of a first game, even going back to my playing days. This is early for us to play our first game,” Fonda said. “But in all honesty we should look like this. We’re in a position that we’re reloading, not rebuilding.”

Naperville North grabbed a 1-0 lead right out of the bat, Steph Tobin reaching on a throwing error on the first pitch of the game. She came around to score on a two-out illegal pitch by Raiders starter Danielle Chitkowski.

Glenbard South, though, quickly struck back with 3 runs in the bottom half of the first.

“First inning, we just had to shake off those early jitters,” Chitkowski said. “Pitching with a lead is one of my favorite things to do, and with this offense if we get 3 runs in one inning we could get 4 in the next. Giving up one run, I just need to move on.”

Glenbard South made good use of its baserunners, scoring 5 of its runs with two outs. In the first, after a Chitkowski sacrifice fly scored Brianna Meath, Jane Trzaska doubled in Hannah Davey and Hannah Taylor singled off the pitcher’s glove to score Trzaska with the third run. Davey’s two-out towering double to deep left in the second scored Meath, and Chitkowski hit a hot-shot off the third baseman’s glove to bring in Davey, making it 5-1.

Trzaska shot her second double up the alley in right-center to score Davey in the fourth to make it 8-2, after Davey had squeezed in Rachel Cohen.

“For the first game I was very happy with their at-bats,” Fonda said. “We were efficient.”

On the flip side, Naperville North couldn’t cash in on several opportunities.

The Huskies had baserunners in all but one inning but stranded two runners apiece in the second, third and fourth innings. Naperville North was 0-for-8 with runners on base until Tobin beat out an RBI bunt single in the fourth.

“We were in position to score a bunch of runs today,” Huskies coach Jerry Kedziora said. “It’s something to work on, is two-out hits. We struggled with that early last year too.”

Tobin, taking the leadoff spot previously held by graduated Huskies catalyst Sammy Marshall, singled twice and reached base three times.

“We lost an awful good leadoff hitter,” Kedziora said, “but we think Tobin’s going to do some special things for us.”

Chitkowski bore down in big spots after walking six batters over the first four innings. She came back from down 3-0 in the count to strike out a batter with two on in the second, fanned Huskies standout Caitlin Warren looking on a full count with two on in the third and struck out the side to work out of a jam in the fourth.

“Dani, she’s kind of a gamer,” Fonda said. “When runners are in scoring position she gets stronger and bears down.”