The third-ranked Remsen St. Mary’s softball team scored a top-15 win on Wednesday night beating No. 14 Akron-Westfield at home by a score of 9-2.
Right away, the Hawks were aggressive at the plate jumping out to a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning by not waiting around at the dish. Remsen St. Mary’s head coach Monte Harpenau says the Hawks have been improving on that approach as the season moves along.
That aggressiveness came to a head in the bottom of the third inning when the Hawks loaded the bases and Marina Cronin unloaded them with a bases-clearing triple. Harpenau says aggressiveness turned into confidence for her at the plate.
On the flip side, Akron-Westfield was down 5-0 after three innings without being able to form a response. Todd Colt is back at the reigns of the Akron-Westfield softball team, and he has seen some stellar softball teams in his day. He says Remsen St. Mary’s is one of those stellar softball teams that has all the right pieces.
The Hawks would score another run in the fourth to go up 6-0 and cap off their scoring with three runs in the sixth to take a 9-0 lead. The Hawk offense seem to get a jolt every time Carmindee Ricke was at the dish. She finished 3-4 with a double, a triple, and two runs batted in. She missed last season, but Coach Harpenau says it is like she never skipped a beat.
The Westerners were able to end the night on a positive with a pair of runs in the top of the seventh inning before ultimately falling to 15-4 on the season. The loss snapped an eight-game winning streak for the Westerners who are on the right track after three losses in their first ten games. This season, Coach Colt is not as worried about wins or losses, but he says constant improvement is the main focus.
The Hawks are now 13-0 on the season and have won 14 games in a row dating back to last year’s state tournament consolation win over St. Edmond. It can sometimes be challenging for a team of this caliber to be able to turn it up to 100 for every game. Coach Harpenau says the experience and the constant drive for improvement helps keep the girls focused on the task at hand.
Akron-Westfield has a back-to-back night hosting Gehlen Catholic in a game you can hear on KLEM at 7:00 PM. The Hawks are at Hinton for a War Eagle Conference matchup on Friday.
