With the SOL season coming down to its final games, two of the three conference races are still very much up for grabs.
Pennsbury – undefeated in the league - has a one-game lead over Neshaminy, and the two teams will meet in the regular season finale next Tuesday with the conference title once again at stake.
In the Continental Conference, Central Bucks South has a one-game lead over Hatboro-Horsham. The two teams split their season series with the Hatters eking out a 1-0 win last Tuesday to get themselves back in the title hunt.
Norristown, which boasts a two-game lead in the American Conference, already owns a share of the conference title and needs just a win in one of its final two league games against Upper Dublin and Cheltenham to defend its conference crown.
It should be an interesting final week.
Power surge – There’s been an unmistakable power surge in the SOL this season.
Home runs are jumping off the bats of more than a few players, and according to Souderton coach Courtney Hughes, that sudden rise in home runs didn’t just happen but can be directly attributed to the new Olympic style lifting techniques employed by many of the players.
“We spend a lot of time working on strength training, and the girls are stronger,” the Indians’ first-year coach said.
Hughes knows a thing or two about hitting home runs. The former All-American still holds the single season record for home runs at Lock Haven University where she led her team to a national championship. She attributes her success to improved lifting techniques.
“My first year, we didn’t do that type of lifting, but then my second, third and fourth years – we started that, and we saw our home runs jump,” Hughes said.
Meet some of the SOL’s top power hitters.
- Allie Chase was part of a ‘power class’ of freshmen at Central Bucks East. The sweet-swinging third baseman – who bats clean-up – has seven home runs. She also is hitting at a torrid .523 clip with a slugging percentage of 1.068 and an on-base percentage of .543. She has 17 of East’s 46 RBIs.
“Everything she does is powerful – her throw, her swing,” East coach Erin Scott said. “Mechanically, she has her own style, her own swing, and a lot of her home runs have been when she has been behind in the count.
“You know when you’re behind the count, the pitcher is more than likely going to throw you a pitch that’s tough to hit. She’s managing to get powerful hits on tough pitches.”
The freshman phenom is 23-of-44 at the plate and has struck out just six times. She also boasts blazing speed on the base paths.
“She has a lot of things going for her – her attitude, her mentality, her competitiveness, her high expectations of herself,” Scott said. “She has a great arm, she has great composure under pressure, and she’s really supportive of her teammates. If she makes a mistake, she moves own, which shows tremendous maturity.
“I think the neatest thing about her is I’m not concerned about her getting a big head. She’s confident, she has fun, she loves the game, but she’s not overly confident. She’s tough on herself but not too tough on herself.
“As freshmen, they are a little bit timid in the beginning, but she’s really coming into her own and showing more personality. She’s having a phenomenal season, but she has so much left of her high school career, which is exciting for us. We definitely have something special.”
- North Penn’s Steph Kulp doesn’t look like your prototype home run hitter. Tall and slender, the junior centerfielder packs a lot of punch in her bat. She also has seven home runs and boasts a pair of two home run games. Her seven home runs is believed to be a single-season record at North Penn.
“Our fence is 200 feet, which most of the colleges are in the NCAA,” coach Rick Torresani said. “When she hits a home run, she hits a long, towering fly ball.
“She reminds me of the (former) Philadelphia Phillies player, Pat Burrell. When he hit them, he hit long, long fly balls that just kept going and going and going, and that’s what Steph does. She’s tall, but she’s not a big kid. She doesn’t look like a powerful kid, but she’s got a nice, sweet, strong, short swing, and when it goes, it goes.”
Kulp, according to Torresani, didn’t display this kind of power as a member of the junior varsity last year.
“For some reason this year, she’s come out –and especially in critical situations in games – she’s come through,” Torresani said. “I don’t think there’s been one that has just barely been over. They may have all gone as far as 215-220 feet.
“In Steph’s case, these weren’t line drives that would have gone for home runs. These are legitimate shots that are going to go over anyone’s fence except perhaps CB South.”
- Souderton’s Olivia Shoemaker has six home runs to go along with three triples. This week, she had two homers in two days. The Indians’ senior captain, according to her coach, doesn’t just boast strength. She’s also a fierce competitor.
“I wish I could have a whole lineup of Olivias – then we would be alright,” Souderton coach Courtney Hughes said. “What she does – she goes into the batter’s box, and she has an intensity in her face and eyes that you can see from third base, that you can see from behind the plate. Everybody can see it.
“She’s just going up there and hitting pitches. She’s trying to get her teammates going with those hits. She’s doing what she can. Those are the things we’re trying to do, but unfortunately, she’s not coming up in situations where people are on base. She’s our leader 100 percent.”
*If there are additions to the home run chase that have not been included, please write to SuburbanOneSports@comcast.net.
A team player – Ashley Alden is nine months removed from rotator cuff surgery, and although she received the green light to pitch several weeks ago, William Tennent coach Gary Bizacquino has no interest in rushing Alden back to the mound.
“I said to her, ‘You’ll never, ever pitch a whole game here. I’m not losing you over two weeks. Your whole career is ahead of you,’” the Panthers’ first-year coach said. “If that was any other kid, they probably never would have come back in the time she came back. She also played basketball last winter and only missed a couple of pre-season games.
“She’s in great physical condition, and she’s a hard worker. She goes all-out in practice. I can’t say enough about the kid.”
Through last week, Alden – who regularly is pitched out - is hitting at a sizzling .514 clip with three home runs, two triples, two doubles and 11 RBIs.
“She’s so good – sometimes we take for granted what she can do,” Bizacquino said. “I often say to her – ‘You don’t even know how good you really are.’
“What separates her from the other players is she’s always trying to correct something she did wrong, which at this level you don’t hear much about. You have kids say, ‘Well, I went 2-for-3 today,’ but she’s not about that. She’s not about herself. She’s about – how can I get better and make the team better?”
Alden was named the only captain of this year’s squad.
“Her leadership has been superb,” Bizacquino said. “Whatever we’ve asked her to do, she’s done.
“She plays on a big-time travel program(the Warrington Blue Thunder) that wins a lot, and to come here – when we get beat, I know it’s tough on her. It was tough on her in the beginning when she was a freshman, but she’s gotten much better with her attitude – how to take the game and how to go from one game to the next now instead of worrying on what she did the last game. She’s much better at taking it day by day, and it’s made her a much better player.”
Alden has seen most of her action at first and third base, but she can play outfield and even went behind the plate for several innings.
“I could put her anywhere,” Bizacquino said. “She’s very coachable and knows the game.
“She’s so far ahead of everyone when it comes to knowing the game – it’s frightening. I’m going to be biased – she’s the best player in our conference by far. I’m a little spoiled.”
Falcons on a roll – Pennsbury has won 14 in a row since a non-league loss to Red Bank Catholic on April 10, but the Falcons suffered a setback last week when they lost senior third baseman Rebecca Erb to a foot injury. She will be in a cast for three weeks.
In her absence, junior Savanna Grantham – who opened the season 1-for-11 - has picked up some of the slack. In Tuesday’s win over Council Rock South, Grantham was 3-for-4 with a double, two runs scored and four RBIs. One night earlier, the junior first baseman was 3-for-4 with four RBIs in the Falcons’ 11-4 win over Conwell Egan.
“She is just on fire,” coach Frank McSherry said. “She has had so many big hits for us. She has really stepped up.
“She wasn’t used to the whole varsity atmosphere, and she just worked hard, made some adjustments and she’s really playing well both defensively and offensively.”
Another player who has been red hot is junior D’Anna Devine. The gifted second baseman, who has been nursing a quad pull, was rested in Tuesday’s win over Rock South.
Before that, Devine was 3-for-3 with three runs scored and two RBIs in the win over Egan. In the Falcons’ win over Tennent, she was 2-for-4 with a triple, two runs scored and one RBI. Against Abington, Devine was 3-for-4 with two RBIs. In the Falcons’ win over Bensalem, she was 2-for-4 with three runs scored and – for good measure – a three-run home run.
“She’s had some unbelievable games,” McSherry said. “She’s been fire as well. She’s a special athlete, there’s no doubt about it, but she’s even been more special the last two to three weeks.”
On the mound, senior pitcher Kait Schilling – quietly and without fanfare – is turning in another stellar season for the Falcons.
“It just seems she pitches her best games in the big games,” McSherry said. “I hope it continues because we have some big ones ahead of us.”
The Falcons face Truman on Thursday and – with a conference crown at stake - will close out the regular season with a huge game against Neshaminy next Tuesday.
Back in action – Jon Kandrick was looking for an MVP season from Maggie Creciun. The Norristown coach certainly didn’t take into account that his team might be without his standout senior shortstop for three weeks, but that’s exactly what happened when Creciuin was diagnosed with mono on April 8.
“She was not allowed to play or practice,” Kandrick said. “The kid was completely lost. Softball is her everything, and it was her senior year.
“I felt bad for her. The doctor told her, ‘See you in four weeks.’ She told the doctor, ‘I’ll be here next week.’ She called the doctor during the week, and she went to see him every week until he cleared her. That’s the type of kid she is. She wants to play.”
It became particularly difficult for Creciun to watch from the sidelines when she started the feel better, but an enlarged spleen posed a risk if she returned to action.
“During that stretch, we lost to Wissahickon,” Kandrick said. “She took that pretty hard because she knows if she’s there it might have been different. She’s such a competitor.
“It was probably the first time in her life she couldn’t do what she wanted to do, but she did what she could. She encouraged the team. She was just a complete coach’s dream.”
Kandrick and Creciun maintained regular contact even though she wasn’t playing.
“She always talked to me about practices,” the Eagles’ coach said. “The kid knows the game so well, and I enjoy talking to her about the game because she presents things in a different light. As a coach, we look at things as adults. Sometimes we have to look at things from a kid’s level. She gave me an opportunity to do that.”
Without a backup shortstop, Kandrick was forced to scramble and moved veteran centerfielder Shari Lynne Kluth to the infield. He also brought his freshman pitcher from the junior varsity to play outfield. Kluth, according to Kandrick, was solid as a fill-in.
“I know that helped Maggie because she knew we weren’t hurt in that position,” Kandrick said.
Creciun received the green light to play on April 30.
“She has been great,” Kandrick said. “She’s constantly helping out at practices, and she’s back hitting again.
“That took the pressure off of Shari Lynn because she doesn’t have to be leadoff. Maggie thrives in that position. She likes the pressure. She’s back to her old self again.”
Continental showdown – On paper, Thursday’s SOL contest pitting Central Bucks South against North Penn might not look like much of a contest. After all, the Titans downed the Maidens 10-0 in an early season meeting that saw the mercy rule go into effect.
Coach Rick Torresani believes it is a vastly different Maiden squad that will take the field against the Titans on Thursday. When the two teams last met, the Maidens were in the midst of a stretch that saw them drop three of four games, allowing 28 runs in those three losses combined.
“To be honest with you, the break – I don’t know if you want to call it a break, but the strike – at the beginning I didn’t think it would affect the girls, but it did,” Torresani said. “They have rituals they do the day of every game - the clothes they wear, how they talk, where they meet.
“I didn’t think that would take it away, but it took away a lot of it. I’m not saying that’s the reason we lost –we just didn’t play well, but ever since the strike is over, the kids have done really well.”
Included in North Penn’s recent wins were a pair of mercy rule wins over Central Bucks East and Council Rock South as well as a convincing win over Souderton and a shutout of Lansdale Catholic.
“We’re playing really good ball, and Kellianna Bradstreet is back to her form,” Torresani said of his junior pitcher. “We are playing the best we’ve played all year so far.”
Bradstreet, according to the Maidens’ coach, is part of the turnaround.
“Having coached pitchers before when I was in the Catholic League, any little thing that takes you off your rhythm can set you off, and then you start thinking,” Torresani said. “When you go out to pitch, instead of making it a natural thing, you start to think before you throw.
“That’s what I really think she was doing. She got back to working with her pitching coach. She found the mistakes she was making. She worked on it at practice, and now it’s more natural. She doesn’t have to think before she throws.”
The Titans, meanwhile, received a scare when Fran Carrullo – who had a fever of 101 – was hospitalized for a day last week. Tests for mono were negative, and she was back on the mound for four innings in Tuesday’s rout of CB West, working four scoreless innings.
In Carrullo’s absence, sophomore Haileigh Stocks turned in several impressive outings on the mound.
“Haileigh has been doing fantastically,” coach Jennifer Robinson said. “I have complete confidence in her, but it is nice to have that experience and that confidence that Fran brings as well.”
SuburbanOneSports.com’s Fab Five
- Pennsbury (16-2) (The Falcons are perfect in SOL play with their only losses coming to a pair of powerhouse teams from New Jersey.)
- Neshaminy (12-2) (The Redskins, who are playing without senior standout Christina Udris, have lost only to Pennsbury (2-1) and a powerful Nazareth squad (1-0).)
- Central Bucks South (13-2) (The Titans lost to Hatboro-Horsham last week, but it’s hard to penalize a team for a 1-0 loss to another of the SOL’s top squad.)
- Hatboro-Horsham (12-2) (The Hatters notched a huge win over CB South last Tuesday, and they have not lost since April 15.)
- North Penn (11-5) (The Maidens have won seven of eight since a tough stretch midway through the season that saw them lose three of four games. They will find out if they belong among the league’s elite when they face CB South on Thursday.)
Under consideration: Norristown (12-3) (The Eagles are coming off an impressive win over PW and have control of their own destiny in the American Conference.) Council Rock North (10-5) (CR North is a program on the rise in the National Conference.)
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