Adjustment key to Neuqua victory against St. Charles North
Jamie O’Brien knew very quickly that Plan A wouldn’t be successful against St. Charles North Tuesday.
Plan B worked much better.
Neuqua Valley’s sophomore pitcher settled down after a rocky 3-run first inning, and the Wildcats rallied to beat No. 15 St. Charles North 5-4 in Naperville.
St. Charles North’s first three batters reached versus O’Brien. Sabrina Rabin doubled and Kaitlyn Wasalawski singled — both rockets down the third-base line — and Mickey Goetz drew a walk. O’Brien noticed that an adjustment was in order.
“(Neuqua catcher Rebecca) Lincoln started off having me throw my regular curveball, but we changed to an off-speed and it threw them off a little bit,” O’Brien said. “Faster is my regular speed, but normally when I throw that it goes higher. I slowed it down a little bit and it moved lower in the zone.”
The tweak worked, as O’Brien (6-4) only allowed a run and 4 hits after the first, retiring eight batters in a row at one point.
Neuqua coach Melissa Wilson gave kudos to her young kids for working out the kinks.
“It shows me that Jamie is maturing as a pitcher and learning how to read hitters and be effective,” Wilson said. “I give credit to Rebecca Lincoln as well. She calls all the games and works very well with Jamie.”
It didn’t hurt O’Brien that Neuqua (9-6, 6-1 Upstate Eight Conference) immediately got two runs back in the bottom of the first. O’Brien helped her own cause by tripling in Kat Widup with the first run, and she scored on a wild pitch.
“Sometimes when a team scores a few runs right away on you, you have a tendency to shut down a little bit,” Wilson said. “I was proud that my girls didn’t. They were eager to get those runs back. It restored our confidence.”
Neuqua tied it 3-3 in the fourth. Brooke Meyer reached on an infield hit, and after a Megan Hannigan single Meyer scored on a passed ball. The next inning Kelsey Dominguez sliced a single to right leading off and went all the way to third on a misplay in the outfield. Up stepped Meyer, who drilled Rabin’s first offering into the gap in right-center to score Dominguez and break the tie.
“Kelsey started us off with a great at-bat,” Meyer said, “and I just wanted to switch positions with her, do what I have to do.”
In the sixth trailing 5-3, St. Charles North (9-7, 5-2) got one-out singles from Goetz and Emily Brodner. One out later, Sara Hausl singled to score Goetz but was thrown out in a rundown with the tying run at third base.
“When we’ve lost we’ve just made too many mistakes to beat a good team,” St. Charles North coach Tom Poulin said. “Neuqua is one of the top teams in our conference, and I’m proud that we came in and battled them the way we did — but we feel like we let another one get away in a sense.”
Poulin knows those ups and downs are the necessary growing pains for a young, albeit talented team. Northwestern-bound Rabin (5-3), who was 2-for-3 Tuesday and struck out five, is one of only two returning players off last year’s Class 4A runner-up. Nine of the North Stars’ 13 players are either freshmen or sophomores.
“We just have to keep taking steps,” Poulin said. “We have to go through what that group last year went through for the first couple years. You have to stay positive and learn from wins and losses.”