HOLDEN — The Wachusett Regional High School varsity softball team erupted for 7 runs in the home half of the fourth inning, leading the Mountaineer girls to a 9-1 victory over Leominster High on April 14. The victory over the Blue Devils kept Wachusett’s undefeated streak alive at 5-0. The team now moves on, with nine out of its next 10 matchups on the road against a number of top tier opponents looking to knock off the red-hot green and white.
“They’re(Leominster) a good team, and we had good defense and we hit our spots,” said sophomore starting pitcher Shayna Bakun, who went four innings giving up no runs before yielding the mound to junior Taylor Stuart. “We need to work on our at-bats a little more, getting the bunts down, and making sure we can make the plays and the defense communicates a lot better. Winning the way we have will improve our confidence as the season goes along.”
“We’ve been pitching better than I expected. No disrespect to my pitchers, but they are young,” said WRHS head coach Jason Lanpher. “They’ve been strong early, which is a bonus for us. We haven’t been hitting up until today the way that we can. I think we’re going to play better defense than we have in the past because we haven’t had to play defense that much with the pitching we’ve had. It’s a good combination with the pitching coming up and the defense is getting better. If the hitting shows up the way I know it will, we’ll be potent.
“We’ve looked great in practice, which doesn’t always translate to the games, but I think it’s just early-season stuff and getting repetitions and seeing the ball, which they’re doing well. This team has a lot of depth, and you can see that we got all 19 kids on the roster into the game, and that’s a good thing to have. It’s a good problem to have, having all athletes.”
Wachusett pounced early against Leominster, plating a pair of runs in the second inning. RBI singles from senior co-captain Emma Britt and junior Amanda Roche would ultimately prove to be decisive.
The bats were quiet in the third frame but for a triple by Gracie Granger before the Mountaineers broke out the big bats. Roche would drive home another run in the fourth, followed by back-toback- to-back doubles by Caitlin Ciccone, Tiegan Walsh and McKenzie Caron. After Granger reached on a fielder’s choice, Kendall Grady and Isabella Giaquinto got into the doubles groove, smacking one apiece to up the score to 9-1.
“Usually how it goes is that once one person starts hitting, we all start feeding off each other,” Britt said. “Winning boosts everyone’s confidence, but we can’t get too cocky. We have to keep working hard at practice and playing like we are.”
“If one person gets a good hit, everyone will repeat it,” added senior co-captain Granger. “We come together as a team more once we’re up. We need to continue to communicate more on the field and work hard in practice.”
The Mountaineer girls travel to Newton North High for an 11 a.m. matchup on Saturday, April 22.
