Batavia’s bats go cold

As everyone knows, regardless of the sport, you can’t win if you don’t score.

Batavia’s softball team was reminded of that the hard way Wednesday afternoon. Playing against a pesky Plainfield East squad in the Class 4A Romeoville sectional, the Bulldogs started and ended the game by squandering scoring opportunities and watched their season come to a close with a 3-0 loss.

The game began with a promising start as the Bulldogs mounted a threat in their first at-bats.

“In the first inning, with the bases loaded, I thought for sure we were going to put something on the board,” Batavia coach Ashley Szymski said. “It just didn’t happen.”

Had they managed to push across a run or two, it may have set a different tone for the entire game. Instead, a pattern of futility began to emerge as Batavia again threatened and failed in the second inning.

On the other side of the diamond, the Bengals (21-11) capitalized on a first inning walk by leadoff hitter Nina Maggio, followed by a sacrifice bunt, and capped by an RBI single off the bat of starting pitcher Annie Molek.

“(Maggio) is a catalyst for us, when she gets on base a lot we’re usually pretty successful,” Plainfield East coach Chris Morris said. “We didn’t exactly hit the cover off the ball, but we were able to execute today.”

Molek was also getting the job done on the mound, hitting her spots, and keeping the Bulldogs hitless until Katie Coleman, her pitching counterpart, lined a single to left in the top of the fourth.

Coleman pitched well for Batavia (20-16), and worked out of tough spots in the second and third innings. But her defense let her down in the fifth as 2 infield errors led to 2 unearned runs and a 3-0 lead for Plainfield East.

The way Molek had Batavia’s number, that lead seemed a lot bigger than 3 runs.

“We saw (Batavia) play Naperville Central two weekends ago, knew they would be a tough challenge for us, and had a gameplan coming in,” Morris said.

The Bulldogs, however, were not about to go down quietly. After Molek retied the first two batters in the top of the seventh, Selena Kweder knocked a 1-2 pitch into left for a hit. Meghan Fabian then followed with a bad hop single past the third baseman, and the Bulldogs suddenly had reason for hope.

But that’s as far as the rally got, as another scoring chance, and this time the game, ended in disappointment.

“We had to be aggressive and do a better job of getting those runs across,” Szymski said. “We can’t win if we don’t score, it’s that simple.”