By JOHN ARBTER
woodctystringer@gmail.com
The Iowa Park Lady Hawks swept the Mineola Lady Jackets (4-3, 7-2) in the class 3A state semi-final round last week in Prosper. It concluded an amazing season for the Mineola squad, and will keep the flame of softball alive in the community for years to come.
No recounting of the series would be worth its salt without acknowledging the two aces in the circle, Mineola’s Jadelyn Marshall and Iowa Park’s Callie Berrett. For softball fans, the two provided a pitching clinic. Game one could be very instructive for pitchers and hitters alike. The work of the two in the circle was artful.
Game One pitching lines
Jadelyn Marshall -- 11 innings – 7 hits – 3 K – 2 BB
Callie Berrett – 11 innings – 7 hits – 16 K – 3 BB
While Berrett was dispatching Lady Jacket batters with strike-outs, Marshall was doing what she has done all year – pitching up ground balls. The Lady Jacket defense turned 22 of those ground balls into outs. Of the seven hits surrendered by Marshall, four of them were ground balls which just happened to find the gaps in the infield.
Both pitchers adapted remarkably well to a strike zone which awarded the outside-corner strike, but seemed to disregard the rest of the plate. Dealing with the strike zone is simply part of pitching.
Each team scored three runs in the third inning. With the bases loaded in the top half Mahayla McMahon sent the first pitch she saw to right-center field, driving in three runs.
Marshall had reached with a single, Maddie Short was awarded first on an interference call, and Kaitlyn McMahon had walked.
The top of the order answered for Iowa Park in the bottom half. An infield base hit, two ground ball singles (one up the middle and one through the right side) and a double drove three runs across to knot the game.
So, it stayed until the bottom of the eleventh inning.
A base on balls, a single to right-center and an RBI single slapped through the 5/6 gap gave game one to the Lady Hawks.
The game should never have reached the 11th. While Marshall was setting the Lady Hawks down in order in the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th 8th and 9th innings, the Lady Jackets were leaving baserunners on base. Mineola left nine baserunners stranded… nine.
The inability of Mineola to bring one more run home was due largely to the excellent pitching of Iowa Park’s Berrett. Berrett leveraged the strike zone, as it was being called in that specific game. The Mineola hitters did not. Their frustration grew, which in turn diminished their ability to produce timely hitting.
Eventually, someone had to put a run-producing sequence together. Iowa Park did, and walked-off game one.
In game two the Lady Jackets took a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth. Journie Wilson poked a change-up back up the middle and Coco Nguyen reached on a defensive error. A Texas Leaguer to right by Maddie Short brought Wilson home. Nguyen scored on a fielder’s choice.
The Lady Hawks answered immediately, tying the score in the top of the fifth. They did it with a walk and back-to-back doubles.
Marshall chunked eleven innings the night before. As she came out to start the sixth inning, she had already thrown 85 more pitches. In the sixth, it appeared that she ran out of gas. Iowa Park stroked four base hits in quick succession, including two (2-run) home runs.
Wilson came on in relief. The Lady Hawks hammered her for three consecutive base hits and another run before Mineola logged the third out.
Two excellent defensive plays featured in the top of the seventh. The lead-off Lady Hawk reached on a walk. The next hitter smashed a double to deep left-center field. Lesliegh Reed played the ball off the wall and slung a beauty of a throw to the cut-off man (Mineola shortstop Kaitlyn McMahon). McMahon sent a perfect throw to Nguyen at the plate and the Lady Hawk runner was out by a mile.
The second out of the inning came on a hard, slicing drive into left field. Reed closed the ball quickly and speared it at knee level while at a full sprint. It was an all-star catch.
The Jackets rallied with two outs in the seventh thanks to a single by Kaitlyn McMahon, a double by Wilson and a free pass issued to Nguyen. A soft liner ended the rally and the series.
This is America; winning is everything. But, in Texas high school softball there are degrees of winning. Philosophically speaking, both teams playing in this series were winners.