For much of spring break, the Cicero-North Syracuse watched as games against Rome Free Academy, Baldwinsville and Oswego got nixed as a result of various forms of April precipitation.
Before the snow showed up, though, the defending state Class AA champion Northstars managed to travel to Ohio and play four times, splitting those games and gaining valuable experience in the process.
In one close contest, CNS needed a run in the bottom of the seventh inning to beat Keystone, 3-2.
Jessica Gigliotti, getting her turn on the mound, allowing just a pair of fourth-inning tallies. Brittney Lindley earned a pair of RBIs, while Jessica Phillips drove in the other run.
Also, CNS rallied past Bloom-Carroll, 9-8, in a wild affair. The Northstars were up 6-0 by the second inning, only to see Bloom-Carroll use four-run outbursts in the third and fifth innings to catch up.
Unfazed, the Northstars went back in front with three runs in the top of the sixth, and Lindley overcame her early mound struggles (she allowed 10 hits) to blank Bloom-Carroll the rest of the way.
Lindley was also lethal at the plate, with a home run, double and four RBIs. Maggie McDonald doubled and drove in two runs, while Morgan Nandin and Erica Gigliotti earned one RBI apiece.
Otherwise, the Northstars took a pair of one-run defeats. It fell, 3-2, to Canfield, when Erica Gigliotti allowed three runs in the top of the sixth inning, overcoming doubles by Phillips and Lucia Meola.
The other defeat was a 1-0 contest with Dalton where Lindley allowed just five hits, but saw Dalton score in the bottom of the seventh inning to decide it. CNS, for its part, had just three hits.
