D2 Semis: Confident Contenders Roll On

June 12, 2014

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

EAST LANSING – Rozlyn Price’s gutsy performance Thursday afternoon at Secchia Stadium had less to do with how far she’s come in the last year as it was about how far she’s come over the last month.

A year ago, the then-freshman Price pitched the Blazers back to the MHSAA Division 2 Semifinals. But this spring hardly began the way she and Ladywood expected – the Blazers started 8-8, and as recently as May 17, Price walked 17 batters over just more than five innings in the Detroit Catholic League championship game.

Coach Scott Combs said there was a stretch when he didn’t feel he could put his ace in the pitching circle. But he never gave up on her.

“I was struggling a lot in the beginning of the season. My confidence was not there,” Price said. “I’m so thankful having my team behind me, cheering me up after every pitch. Whenever I get down, they always try to pick me up.

“Coach Scott worked with me a lot. He said, ‘Just calm down; just stay focused on the batter, and you’ll be fine.’”

Confident again, Price made a number of gutsy pitches Thursday to lead Ladywood back to the Division 2 Final with a 4-3, 10-inning win over top-ranked Wayland at Secchia Stadium. The No. 7 Blazers (29-13) will face No. 4 Stevensville Lakeshore in Saturday’s championship game at 9 a.m.

Price walked only two batters in the Semifinal and struck out six, including Wayland’s leadoff hitter with bases loaded and her team up 2-1 in the sixth inning. She also stranded a Wildcats runner on third base in the bottom of the ninth.

It was a far cry from her early-season struggles and 12 losses that became more forgettable with Thursday’s win.

“She could not throw a strike, and we worked and worked psychologically to get her to relax,” Combs said. “She was trying to muscle everything, trying to blow it by everybody. … She’s got all the ability in the world, and she’s a great hitter too, but she just needed to learn to focus and relax, and she did.”

Price did hit as well, doubling in her team’s first two runs. Sophomore rightfielder Rachel Hendrickson, batting ninth, tripled in junior Morgan Larkin in the seventh inning and then scored the game-winner in the 10th on senior shortstop Haley Lawrence’s single.

All three were in the lineup last season when Ladywood fell 8-0 to Tecumseh in a Semifinal. Tecumseh went on to win the championship.

This was Ladywood’s fourth straight trip to the Semifinals, and Saturday’s championship game will give the Blazers the opportunity to win their second title in three seasons – although the lineup is almost completely different than the one that won two years ago.  

“It’s just crazy, the difference in the team last year to the team this year,” Price said. “I myself, I feel like I had a lot more confidence in this game than I did last year, or even in the games at the beginning of this season.”

Junior centerfielder Christina Meyer and Lawrence joined Hendrickson with a pair of hits. Every one of Wayland’s starters hit safely, led by senior catcher Britt McLain, senior rightfielder Elyssa Oostdyk, junior pitcher Mallory Teunissen and junior first baseman Morgan Teunissen with two hits apiece.

The Wildcats finished 42-2. Click for the full box score. 

Stevensville Lakeshore 7, Croswell-Lexington 4

A couple things annually are expected from the Stevensville Lakeshore softball team: The Lancers will win at least 30 games and contend for the Division 2 title. 

They won their 30th game this season in the District Final. And they’re back in an MHSAA championship game – even if they didn’t feel the same outside expectations this spring after a rough start.

“Our first game we lost to Edwardsburg, and we’re like, ‘Oh man.’ Portage Central beat us five out of six times,” Lakeshore senior pitcher Haley Thibeault said. “We didn’t start at the top like we have been. We started at the bottom and literally just shot up. We peaked exactly at the right time.” 

The Lancers (35-9) kept the tournament momentum rolling with five runs in the first inning against Croswell-Lexington. They pushed the score to 6-0 in the fifth inning.

Croswell-Lexington (30-2) showed plenty of sparks scoring a pair of runs in both the sixth and seventh innings – but was a hit or two short in both of turning the tide completely. 

Junior pitcher Megan Guitar had two hits and scored a run for the Pioneers. Senior shortstop Kylee Barrett drilled a home run in the seventh inning.

Sophomore leftfielder Rachel Riedel had three hits including two triples and drove in three runs. Freshman second baseman Hunter Thibeault and sophomore rightfielder Sidney Weaver both had two hits. 

Lakeshore’s return to the championship game is its first since winning back-to-back titles in 2010 and 2011.

“Everyone has been saying we’re not as good as last year’s team, or our team is young. (You don’t like) to hear that because we want to go as far as we can,” Haley Thibeault said. “I’m so proud because we’re defying all the odds to come this far. Maybe it doesn’t seem like that to other people, but it’s internal victories to us, moral victories.” 

Click for the full box score.

PHOTOS: (Top) Livonia Ladywood’s Rozlyn Price fires a pitch during her team’s 10-inning Division 2 Semifinal win over Wayland. (Middle) Lakeshore shortstop Alex Forsythe throws to first during her team’s Semifinal win.

D3 Powers Book Championship Matchup

June 16, 2017

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

EAST LANSING – Everyone who follows high school softball in Michigan expected another dominating Meghan Beaubien performance in Friday’s first Division 3 Semifinal.

But few expected a pitchers dual – broken up only by Beaubien the hitter as Monroe St. Mary Catholic Central earned the opportunity to play for a third straight MHSAA championship.

Beaubien allowed just two hits and struck out 15 Shepherd hitters at Secchia Stadium, and also led off the sixth inning with a triple before scoring the game’s lone run as the top-ranked Kestrels escaped the Bluejays and their pitcher Haley Peska 1-0.

Peska, who no-hit No. 4 Millington in Tuesday’s Quarterfinal, allowed only five hits and struck out six in just about matching the state’s most celebrated hurler of the last three seasons.

“We’ve played a lot of really good teams on our way here this year," Beaubien said. "This is a great example of it – Shepherd’s a team that nobody thought would be in the mix at this point, and they just played a great game and almost beat us.

“(But) the experience of being here has helped us mentally and with our confidence.”

Monroe St. Mary (26-3) will next face No. 3 Napoleon in Saturday’s 5:30 p.m. Final.

Maybe not the best news for Michigan State’s softball program – Beaubien will continue her career at University of Michigan – but the St. Mary’s ace has given up four hits total in 33 innings pitched at Secchia over the last three seasons. In fact, Friday’s was the first Semifinal in three seasons that she didn’t throw a no-hitter.

Not that giving up two hits made her any less dominating. That was made plain both in the sound the ball made pounding catcher Kenna Garst’s glove on her many fastballs, but also when she ended the game with a strikeout on a floating change-up that no one in East Lansing was expecting.

She’ll finish her high school career with an ERA well south of a run per game and passed 1,300 career strikeouts a while ago.

“This whole run was like, ‘OK, any game could be your last game.’ I know that,” Beaubien said. “Now I know for sure. Tomorrow is my last game. I don’t think it’s really hit me yet. It’s a little weird. I just want to go out there and make my last game of my career end with another state championship.”

The combination of two superb pitching performances made this one fly by in a mere 77 minutes. Freshman rightfielder Samantha Michael did have two hits in two at bats for St. Mary, with junior shortstop Kelsey Barron doubling in that lone run and junior third baseman Danielle Michael notching the team’s other hit.

Senior centerfielder Ryanne McKenna and junior shortstop Kianna Andrews had the hits for Shepherd (25-19), and of course Peska made the most memorable impact for a Bluejays team playing in its first Semifinal since 1997.

“They’ve got two coaches over there (Bobb Servoss and assistant Terry Lynch) that know a lot about the game … and in this game it’s all about keeping hitters off-balance,” St. Mary coach John Morningstar said. “You’re never letting anyone sit on something, and if all you’ve got is speed in this game it’s going to be a long season. Kids will catch up to that hard ball. Moving it around the way (Peska) does, she’s very effective. She had us chasing a lot of pitches that we wouldn’t normally swing at.”

Click for the full box score.

Napoleon 16, Gladstone 0

Not that more proof was needed on top of a 36-4 record. But Napoleon’s seniors showed again Friday they’re ready for one last matchup with the St. Mary ace.

As freshman, they were part of a team that downed Beaubien and St. Mary in a Regional Final. But she and the Kestrels came back to eliminate the Pirates in a Quarterfinal in 2015, and Napoleon didn’t make it out of the District a year ago.

“We have been looking ahead, and saying we’re going to end up meeting Meghan, we're going to meet her,” Napoleon senior shortstop Paige Kortz said. “And just talking and scouting, hearing scouting reports. Of course they probably have with us (too), but just going ahead and figuring out what their weaknesses are, and we’re going to try to hit them tomorrow.”

They seemed to hit everything Friday, especially during the first inning. Napoleon jumped out to an 8-0 lead and finished the game with 19 hits over five innings.

Senior outfielder Kallie Pittman was 4 for 4 and scored two runs, while senior second baseman Ashton Jordan was 3 for 4 with two doubles, two runs and four RBI. Senior third baseman Haley Rose also was 3 for 4 and scored three runs, while Kortz, senior centerfielder Dylan Wiley, senior catcher Rachel Griffin and junior designated player Caitlin Pace all had two hits. 

Senior Sydney Coe, in addition to driving in two runs, allowed only three hits in the circle and struck out six Gladstone batters. Senior centerfielder Alyssa Polley, sophomore third baseman Sydney Herioux and junior rightfielder Kaitlyn Hardwick hit safely for the Braves (34-10).

This was the fourth Napoleon team to make Quarterfinals and the first to make Semifinals, meaning of course that Saturday’s championship game also will be a first.

“Especially having eight seniors,” Kortz said, “we at the beginning of this season were determined to be Lansing bound. And determined to make school history.”

Click for the full box score.

PHOTOS: (Top) Monroe St. Mary’s Samantha Michael rounds a base during Friday’s win over Shepherd. (Middle) Napoleon’s Sydney Coe takes a swing during the second Division 3 Semifinal.