ONONDAGA COUNTY – When they finished their respective 2019 seasons, a group of area high school softball teams could not have dreamed of how long it would take to return to the diamonds.

But with a lost 2020 season behind them, the games finally started again last week, with Jamesville-DeWitt still the reigning Section III Class A champions leading the fold.

Fayetteville-Manlius, attempting to move up the SCAC Metro division ranks, took a positive first step in last Tuesday’s opener at West Genesee, where a late scoring surge produced an 8-3 victory over the Wildcats.

Two runs in the third inning erased a 1-0 deficit, though WG tied it in the bottom of the third. However, the Hornets broke that 2-2 deadlock with four decisive runs in the top of the sixth, adding two more in the seventh as it finished with 10 hits to the Wildcats’ nine.

Gracie Bishop had three of those hits, including a triple, and finished with four RBIs. Sophie Woodridge did even better, going four-for-five and driving in four runs as Paige Murphy pitched and struck out 13 WG batters.

Late-week rains and cold temperatures caused many postponements, but it cleared out by Saturday in time for East Syracuse Minoa to make quite a season debut against Oswego.

The Spartans bashed the Buccaneers 17-0, accumulating 14 hits along the way, three of them by Morgan Ransom, who also produced a team-best three RBIs and threw a five-inning no-hitter, striking out 10.

Alana Day, Raychel Underwood and Katie Schmidt drove in two runs apiece, with Sierra Daly, Abby Herrington, Natalie Quonce, Olivia Goff and Jaylianna Sabatino each adding an RBI.