Softball: Lake Park pitchers shut out Wheaton Warrenville South
If a softball team has more than one skilled pitcher, why not play them all?
Krystina Okolita and Natalie Grubczak combined for a 3-hit shutout as Lake Park blanked host Wheaton Warrenville South 3-0 on Wednesday afternoon.
Okolita pitched four innings for the win, allowed two hits and struck out two while Grubczak worked the last three innings, allowed one hit and struck out four.
Lancers coach Tom Mazzie said he was planning to use them both in Thursday's scheduled home game against another DuKane Conference rival, Geneva.
The weather is showing some sense of cooperation, plenty of games remain and so teams don't have much down time.
"I don't want to tax them. I want to keep them fresh," he said of his pitchers. "They're different pitchers. They work different parts of the zone."
The hurlers faced a Tigers' lineup that is aggressive at the plate.
"They put everything into every swing, one through nine," Grubczak said.
Lake Park (14-7, 5-0) took a 1-0 lead in the first. Alexa Frale reached on a fielder's choice and scored on Alyssa Sturino's single to center. The Lancers added insurance runs in the fifth. Sturino reached on a fielder's choice and scored thanks to Abby Rodriguez's double to center. Rodriguez would scored on a fielding error.
The Lancers have firmly put themselves into the DuKane Conference race, but the team strives to remain focused at the games ahead.
"We're all playing in the moment," Okolita said.
Mazzie said Lake Park has come a long way since the early days of the season.
"At one time we were 2-5. But we faced so much good pitching early on, now we know how to adjust," he said.
WW South dropped to 13-4, 2-2. Although the team nailed just three hits, it had scoring opportunities, as shown by leaving six runners on base.
Kara Struebing, Maggie Reinert and Emily Bougadis all singled for the Tigers.
"We didn't play the way we've been playing. Lake Park is a good team and we knew they threw well," said WW South coach Jeff Pawlak. "We didn't get enough balls to drop. We need to do a better job making contact."