North Penn senior Julia Shearer tossed a perfect game in North Penn’s 5-0 win over Haverford in the District 1 6A title game Thursday. Photos provided courtesy of Kadi Schenk. Check back for a gallery of photos: https://solsports.zenfolio.com/f63743818
District 1 6A Final
#1 NORTH PENN 5, #10 HAVERFORD 0
Julia Shearer makes perfection look easy.
The Knights’ senior pitcher tossed the first perfect game of her remarkable career, and she certainly made it look easy, striking out 16 of the 21 batters she faced while not allowing a ball out of the infield in yet another dazzling outing
.
“Everything was working,” coach Rick Torresani said. “To defend Haverford, I don’t think they’ve ever seen anyone like her. It’s hard when you haven’t seen anyone like her. She just was awesome, just awesome. I don’t have any other words to say.”
Senior Annabelle Smink realized Shearer was onto something special in the fifth inning.
“I’m like – ‘All right, we’re still clean. No one has touched a bag,’” the Knights’ shortstop said. “I kept looking at the scoreboard, and it kept saying zero.
“She makes it look easy – she does her thing, she doesn’t change anything.”
Midway through the game Shearer realized she was throwing a no-hitter.
“They weren’t really making good contact with the ball,” the Knights’ senior ace said. “In the sixth inning, that’s when I really started to lock down. I was working on strikeouts that last inning, and it worked out well.
“It doesn’t matter the team – I’m going to go out with my best performance either way. I rely on the bats, I rely on the defense. It’s me I’m worried about, so I’m just going to pitch the same.”
Shearer picked up where she left off in Tuesday’s 3-2 overtime win over Plymouth Whitemarsh when she closed out the game by retiring 20 in a row. Throw in her 21 straight outs Thursday, and the University of Maryland-bound senior has retired 41 batters in a row in a dazzling stretch in the circle.
Shearer also surpassed the 300-strikeout milestone for the season in Thursday’s win, and in just two seasons, she has 610 strikeouts.
“I just felt like I was dealing today, and I just kept that energy throughout the game,” Shearer said. “ As the game went on and on, I became more and more comfortable. That’s a good hitting team.”
Shearer’s batterymate – Sarah Sabocsik – has been behind the plate for all of Shearer’s masterpieces.
“I kind of knew throughout the game no one got on base,” the Knights’ senior catcher said. “You never see this happen. She’s had so many no-hitters, but seeing a perfect game for the first time is special.”
The lone tense moment – if it qualified as tense – came when Shearer ran a full count to the leadoff batter in the seventh but struck her out with the next pitch. She struck out the last five batters she faced.
Thursday’s perfect game put an exclamation point on a win that clinched the second straight District 1 6A title for the Knights.
“It’s definitely been a goal for the past year,” Sabocsik said. “Especially getting them back-to-back was definitely special.”
“It’s incredible,” Smink said. “We did it last year, and it was like – I’m a junior, but this year, I was like – ‘That’s insane, we did it back-to-back.’ That’s awesome.”
Thursday’s district title win was the 24th in a row without a loss.
“It put us in a good place moving forward,” Shearer said. “It’s a big thing for us to keep the winning streak going, and it’s a championship. It always feels great to win a championship.
“Now this is in the past. We’re going to work extra hard in practice. Our real goal is going to the state championship, and we just have to take it game by game from here.”
In a contest that saw the Knights struggle to find their offense, Smink reached base on all three of her trips to the plate – once with a bunt single, once when her sacrifice bunt was misplayed, and the third time on a bloop single. She accounted for two of her team’s seven hits.
“The pitchers have a little more spin – we haven’t really seen any of them,” Smink said. “We need to take it one thing at a time. We’re too rushed. We just need to relax and get back to our mojo.
“We had to find a new way, and bunting was the new way today. You have to put the ball on the ground and force them to make a play.”
The Knights reaped immediate dividends when they went to small ball. In the bottom of the third, Shearer drew a one-out walk, and Sabocsik followed with a bunt single. An error on Smink’s sacrifice bunt allowed the game’s first run to score, and Brie Wilmot’s sacrifice fly to right put the Knights on top 2-0.
They took that two-run lead into the bottom of the sixth. Gianna Cimino led off the inning with a double, and a Sophia Orth and Bella Nunn (RBI) followed with back-to-back singles. Casey Sokol’s groundout pushed another run across, and Reyna Doherty laid down a well-executed suicide squeeze to give the Knights a 5-0 lead that stood until the final out.
“We were hitting long fly balls, and they’re playing us deep,” Torresani said. “So when we get a chance, we go to small ball, and we got that chance. It started off with Sarah (Sabocsik) getting a bunt down.
“They made a mistake (on Smink’s bunt), and we capitalized. We put a couple more bunts down and a suicide squeeze.”
For the Knights, Smink was 2-for-2 while Cimino was 2-for-3 with a double and run scored.
North Penn (24-0, 16-0 SOL) will host Governor Mifflin – District 3’s fourth place team – in Monday’s opening round of the PIAA 6A Tournament.
Haverford 000 000 0 0-0-1
North Penn 002 003 x 5-7-0
About the Author
