Softball: St. Charles North finishes off West Aurora
By completing some unfinished business on Saturday, the. St. Charles North softball team returned to the win column.
The host North Stars and West Aurora resumed play of an April 13 game that was suspended in the bottom of the third inning because of rain, with North ahead, 2-1.
The North Stars won the resumption of the Upstate Eight crossover contest, 3-2, snapping a two-game losing streak.
"We have been inconsistent so it's good to get a win and hopefully, to build on for next week. We have Geneva Monday and Friday and Larkin on Tuesday - three big conference games- and possibly another rescheduled game in there," North coach Tom Poulin said. "Consistency is what we are shooting for on a daily basis and I think that it will come."
The North Stars (8-6, 5-3) scored what would be the winning running in the fifth.
Starting pitcher Jillian Waslawski reached base on a fielders choice. The senior right-hander advanced to third on Grace Quin's groundout. Waslawski then scored on shortstop Grace Sobieski's slap double to the gap in left field on the first pitch she saw from Blackhawk starter Gab Drager to put the North Stars up, 3-1.
"I heard that she was throwing first pitch strikes to basically every hitter that we had so I was looking to get that first pitch and put it where I could to get that run in," Sobieski said. "I feel like I'm more in control when I make a hard slap so that's what I was going for."
Sobieski also ended a West Aurora (4-8, 4-4) scoring threat earlier in the top of the inning. With two outs and the bases loaded, Drager hit a soft liner to short that the junior snared before it hit the ground.
Waslawski wiggled out of another jam in the seventh.
Shai Erdrich opened the inning with a single and advanced to second when Janae Holloway followed with another single.
North caught a break when the third batter, Gabi Nilles, was called out for being out of the batter's box on her attempted sacrifice bunt. Sophia Delgado followed with the third single of the inning that plated Erdrich and narrowed North's lead to 3-2.
Delgado was erased from the base paths when she was forced out at second on Faith Pokryfke's fielders choice. Waslawski sealed the victory by inducing Drager to fly out to left field for the final out.
"We got out of a couple of jams. We haven't being getting out of those regularly so to get out twice today was good," Poulin said.
"They were able to tack a run on and we tacked one on. It was a good game. I feel like we were pretty evenly matched," said West Aurora coach Randy Hayslett. "Overall we played well. We put people on, we moved the ball and we put pressure on them. They just made a couple more plays than we did."