Timely hits lead Towanda past Troy.
By: Chris Manning | Towanda Daily Review | May 23, 2014 | Photo courtesy Chris Manning
2014 NTL and District 4 News
EAST TROY - There's an old adage that it's hard to beat a good team three times.
Troy found that out on Thursday.
Towanda rode big hits from Koryn Wickwire and Emily Gorman to a 4-1 win over the Trojans to advance to the District IV, Class AA semi-finals at Elm Park.
"It feels incredible," Black Knight pitcher Alaina Wickwire remarked. "We lost to them twice this season but we came back in districts and took it away from them. It feels pretty good."
"Our girls played a great game," added Towanda coach Bryon Fuller. "We knew we had to stop their number 1-and-2 hitters. Their speed and how they get on the base all the time makes their whole offense go."
Despite losing to them twice during the season Towanda knew they could play with the NTL Large School champions.
"We knew we had this from the beginning," Alaina Wickwire said.
But they also knew they would have to bring their A-game.
"That's a heck of a ball club," said Fuller. "They're the NTL champs for a reason. They got great coaching, they're a classy bunch. Any time you play a Troy softball team you better come to play and figure out a way to beat them."
Koryn Wickwire and Gorman combined to go 4-for-6 with a double and a triple. Wickwire scored twice while Gorman knocked in three of the Knights' four runs.
Gorman especially came up big as it was her hits in the fourth and sixth that got the scoring going.
"Emily Gorman has done a great job," said Fuller. "Had two big hits tonight."
Sam Schoonover and Casey Hawley also had hits in the game for Towanda while Schoonover and Sarah Dawsey crossed home.
They also got a good performance from Alaina Wickwire in the circle. She only had two strikeouts but kept Troy's hitters off balance all afternoon.
Wickwire allowed just three hits, no earned runs and no walks on 84 pitches. The Trojans made contact often but it was typically a ground ball right at a defender.
"I count on my defense a lot," said Alaina Wickwire.
For Troy, freshman Kerrigan Hoffmann started strong, going perfect through three innings. But the second and third times through the Black Knight line-up did her in.
She finished in six innings with eight strikeouts, six hits, four earned runs and no walks on 90 pitches. Jerilyn Ross threw the seventh inning, allowing one walk on 11 pitches.
Kelsey Bristol, Brooke Losey-Root and Kayla Stephani had the three Troy hits while Taylor Murray scored their lone run.
Fuller came up with the idea of shifting his defense to the left side whenever Bristol and Faith Ceely came up to the plate, two lefties who traditionally hit the opposite way.
"We came up with the idea of making them try to pull the ball and see what could happen," he said.
The shift worked, especially in the sixth when a line-drive by Bristol that would normally find a gap to the outfield landed in the glove of an outstretched Koryn Wickwire.
"Our shortstop made two great plays on them," Fuller said of Wickwire.
Early on it looked like the Trojans had the edge.
Bristol led off with a single in the bottom of the first then reached on a sacrifice bunt. However, Towanda caught her in a rundown for the second out of the inning followed by Alaina Wickwire getting Taylor Johnston to ground out to end the threat.
In the second inning was when Troy scored.
With one out Taylor Murray reached on an error. Then with two outs a Losey-Root single to center field allowed Murray to reach third, putting runners on second and third.
Then when Alaina Wickwire went to deliver her first pitch to the next Troy batter she lost grip of the ball and it rolled back to second base. Murray wasted no time, taking home to put the Trojans up 1-0.
However, that would be the last time Troy had a real scoring threat.
In the top of the fourth is when the Knights began to hit.
Koryn Wickwire led off, beating a slow roller to the second baseman for an infield single.
Just that little hit appeared to change the momentum in the game.
"I set the tone a lot for the rest of the team," explained Koryn Wickwire. "Once I get on base everybody else picked it up."
She would steal second and eventually score on Gorman's double over the left fielder's head to knot the game up at 1-all.
Then on the next at bat Alaina Wickwire would reach on an error putting runners on the corners. After Wickwire stole second a wild pitch allowed Gorman's courtesy runner, Sarah Dawsey, to take home and give Towanda a 2-1 lead.
In the fifth the Knights threatened again as Hawley led off with a bunt single but with two outs was caught trying to steal third.
It would be the sixth inning where Towanda did more damage.
Koryn Wickwire led off with a triple to the outfield wall.
"It was nice," she said about the hit. "I didn't expect a change-up because I crushed one off her last time."
With one out Schoonover laid down a bunt and reached first as Troy's third baseman, Brooke Mattocks, made sure Koryn Wickwire stayed at third. Schoonover would eventually steal second.
That put Gorman in another big spot and the clean-up hitter responded for the second time, hitting a 2-run single to put the Knights up 4-1.
Towanda will now take on the winner of Wyalusing at Loyalsock, a game that was postponed on Thursday due to thunderstorms.
Alaina Wickwire hopes she can take the performance she had at East Troy down to Williamsport.
"I just want to keep pitching like I did," she said. "And have my defense behind me like we did, even better than we did and hopefully we can go all the way."
Their coach plans on looking inward as they get ready for next Tuesday's game.
"We're just going to concentrate on the fundamentals of the game," Fuller explained. "Hopefully Alaina can keep throwing the ball the way she's been throwing the ball and work on our hitting, our bunting. We're very happy with winning this ball game but we've got two more to go with winning this district championship. We'll take one at a time."
