By Bevin Bixby
I&M Staff Writer
The Lady Whalers got in some serious preseason preparation this weekend at the Falcon Festival in Mashpee. The varsity softball team, which was supposed to play six scrimmages, ended up playing seven when another team wasn’t able to show up.
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Photo by Nicole Harnishfeger
Cassie Moran takes a pitch during the Falcon Festival Sunday. |
Nantucket left the festival with a 3-4 record. Head Coach Chris Maury was pleased with the weekends overall performance.
“I was most impressed with the offense. We’ve got some things defensively that we need to work on, but we did a much better job on Sunday than in Saturday’s scrimmages, so that’s good. It showed we improved,” he said.
The Lady Whalers were supposed to open the season at Blue Hills Tuesday, but the game was postponed to today due to inclement weather. The team was also scheduled to host Martha’s Vineyard yesterday, too late for this edition of sports, and then play three straight away games: at Chatham Friday, South Shore Saturday and Cape Cod Tech on Monday.
Over the weekend, freshman Kelly Reid got some valuable pitching practice.
“Kelly did a great job, and she gives us another pitcher to go to this season.
We also did a great job hitting, the offense looks good,” said Maury. Senior Molly Lentowski had a triple in Saturday’s first scrimmage and a home run in the second. Maury said he is “looking forward to the season. It’s a great group of kids. With that last scrimmage they’d given us a great effort all weekend long, and we wanted it to end that way and we did. I told the girls I was pleased and proud of them. It had been a long, cold weekend and they didn’t fade at all. I think the girls came out of the scrimmages very confident. They played some of the same teams as last year and did a lot better.”
JV softball
The JV softball team squeaked out an 8-7 victory over Blue Hills to win its first game of the season Monday. Due to poor weather, the girls played only five innings.
“The biggest issue was it was sort of like playing on a skating rink,” coach Robert Reid said. Regardless, he liked what he saw. “We’re a really experienced team. We don’t really lose anything freshman, to sophomore, to junior. We look very good. They’re a hard-working group of girls, and we’re only going to get better.”
The conditions were less then desirable, but the girls managed to play a good game.
“Morgan Tornovish pitched the entire game. She only had a couple walks, which is amazing for her first game. Kate Godlesky had a two-run triple in the top of the fifth. Alexa Moran played catcher and was able to keep the ball in front of her. Shelby Campbell played short and second. She did really well in the field, made some great plays,” Reid said.
Coach Bill Ciarmataro agreed, recalling one play when the Whalers were “up by one and the ball was hit in the air. Ashley Clinger, who was playing first, tried to catch it with her glove, then her bare hand, but she was stuck in about three inches of mud from the clay field. Campbell came over and caught it.”
Ciarmataro also noted a couple defensive adjustments they had to make in the field, adding that sophomore Jordan Salter did a “great job” at her first time playing third. “It was a good game, something to open up with and get ready for the Vineyard,” said Ciarmataro.
The team was scheduled to travel to Martha’s Vineyard yesterday, too late for this edition of sports, and host Cape Cod Tech Monday. When asked about his hopes for the rest of the season Reid replied said, “We’d like to play as hard as we can and get as many of these girls ready for varsity as we can. The schedule is definitely a step up in competition from previous years. We look at this as a program: it’s a long-term thing. Just get kids as much experience as we can.”
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