Different mentality, different result for Waubonsie Valley
Wednesday was not a lot of fun for Shannon Hohman and her Waubonsie Valley teammates, so they decided to turn things around the Thursday at Naperville North.
With Hohman pitching well and delivering the game-winning hit in a 7-3 defeat of the Huskies, the Warriors (17-6) looked much sharper than the team that had been upset by Glenbard East 24 hours earlier.
"Today we just came out loose and had a different mentality," said Hohman, who allowed 2 runs in the first inning on Thursday before holding Naperville North to just 1 run and 2 hits over the last six innings. "After yesterday's loss we just needed to wipe it off and not let it define our season and that's what we did today."
After falling 4-2 to Glenbard East and then getting behind 3-1 after three innings on Thursday, the Warriors played exceptional softball while coming from behind to win.
Sabrina Calabrese's RBI bloop double in the fifth scored Audria Wagenknecht to tie the score at 3-3, and Hohman's liner up the middle brought home what proved to be the winning run in the sixth. Waubonsie Valley then tacked on three insurance runs in the seventh to secure the nonconference win.
"Yesterday we kind of had a tough loss," said Calabrese, who went 2-for-4 with 2 runs from the lead-off spot. "The coaches were like, 'No, get yourself together and tomorrow come out ready to play.' I think we really did that today."
It helped to have Hohman on top of her game. With one out in the first, Naperville North's Kelsey Warren slapped an infield single and Alexis Solak walked. When Rachel Martin followed with a single and Dani Biesiada drove home a run with a grounder, it was 2-0 Huskies (11-8).
But Hohnman, who struck out the side in the second inning and finished with 8 strikeouts, settled down well. Solak doubled home Rachel Aiardo to give the Huskies a 3-1 lead in the third, but the Waubonsie pitcher did not allow a hit over the final four innings.
"Part of having fun is when you score 7 runs. You don't have fun when you score 2 runs," Hohman said. "You just don't. I think that's what it was today. We were loose, we were getting runners on base and scoring. That's how you win games, and you have fun."
She was well aware of Solak, who recently had a 30-game hitting streak snapped in a game in which she was walked three times.
"Going into it I know that Naperville North is having a really good season and they're a good hitting team and their No. 3 hitter (Solak) is a great hitter," Hohman said. "It was just about moving the ball around and hitting my spots. My defense was on today and they're the reason we won."
Huskies coach Jerry Kedziora liked the way Biesiada pitched for his team, but he had to tip his hat to Hohman and the Warriors after the game.
"She's one of the best pitchers in the area and I think we hit her pretty well," he said of Hohman. "We hit the ball hard and we had some positions to score some more runs there earlier in the game and we just didn't execute or get the breaks that we needed."
"They didn't make any mistakes today and we did. We misplayed some balls, kicked the ball around a little bit … we're not going to beat a good team by making mistakes. And yet we were still in it for six innings."