Having lost its first two games this season, including one to archrival Liverpool, the Cicero-North Syracuse softball team faced a bit of urgency going into what was supposed to be its busiest stretch of the regular season.
Yet when the Northstars took on reigning sectional Class AA champion Baldwinsville last Tuesday afternoon, everything, especially the pitching, clicked and C-NS knocked off the Bees 3-0.
Throughout the game, the Bees gave itself chances, netting seven hits to C-NS’s five. Layla Trendowski had two of those hits, with Julianna Gingrich, Frankie DeSantis, Bella Hotchkiss, Leah Verschneider and Mackenzie Southworth all getting hits, too.
None of it led to runs, though. Combined, Northstars pitchers Kiyara Bembry (four innings) and Lilian Hotaling (three innings) escaped possible jams and notched 11 strikeouts between them.
Hotchkiss, B’ville’s pitcher, earned 10 strikeouts, but five hits and five walks proved costly, C-NS getting single runs in the first, fourth and fifth innings.
Sydney Rockwell led with a single, double and RBI. Eva Farone walked twice and scored a run, with Aubrey Coyle and Paige Pangaro getting the other RBIs, Erica Hibbard also scored a run.
Liverpool, fresh off those impressive wins over C-NS and reigning sectional Class B champion Chittenango, had a challenge last Tuesday against West Genesee, but rallied late to beat the Wildcats 6-4.
WG had beaten C-NS a week earlier and, despite losses to Whitesboro and Rome Free Academy, inched in front twice against the Warriors with single runs in the first and fourth innings.
Down 2-1, Liverpool did exactly what it did in that game with the Northstars – namely, put up five runs in the sixth inning, taking advantage of a poor Wildcats defense which finished with five errors.
Only Maya Mills was credited with an RBI as Katia Flavin, Joelle Wike, Lauren Ragonese, Emily Nestor and Alexis Mathers scored runs, as did Mackenzie Frani, who overcame six hits and three walks to strike out nine in a complete-game effort.
Saturday brought, for Liverpool, a trip to the Grand Slam Tournament at Ballston Spa, where the Warriors met two Section II opponents – and lost to both of them.
The first game was far closer, a 6-5 defeat to Shaker where leads of 1-0, 2-1 and 5-3 all got away, the last of them in a sixth inning where Liverpool’s three runs were answered by three from the Blue Bison, who held on from there. Mills had two of her team’s seven hits while joining Wike, Ava Falvo and Alivia Henty-Goldberg in the assist column.
Then host Ballston Spa jumped all over the Warriors, prevailing 14-1 as it netted four runs in three of the first four innings to go with a two-run second after Frani singled home Mills in the top of the first.
C-NS, meanwhile, had its doubleheader at the Gillette Road complex against Shenendehowa and Saratoga Springs from Section II postponed, but did play at New Hartford and took a 1-0 defeat to the Spartans.
Hotaling was superb through most of her duel with New Hartford ace Ruby Gehringer, only allowing one hit – a single to Alessandra D’Apice. Olivia Vitullo scored the lone run in the bottom of the fourth.
The Northstars got three hits off Gehringer, one each by Pangaro, Mila Owens and Payton Bach, yet could not cross the plate, Gehringer recoring six strikeouts.
