RallyNorth.net

Wed, May 07, 2008 04:00 PM @ Salem (MA)

Team	Final
Marblehead	5
Salem (MA)	3

Marblehead softball team tops Salem

Wednesday, May, 07 By Mike Grenier
Staff writer

SALEM | Marblehead High ace pitcher Courtney Colantuno strapped an ice pack on her right shoulder immediately after last night's game. She needed it.

Colantuno & Co. have played three games in three days and, in terms of competitiveness, the Salem Witches have played them as tough as anybody else in the Northeastern Conference. Fortunately for the Magicians, they had more than the usual incentive as the players' mothers rode the bus with the team to Mack Park for the second straight year. Marblehead is 2-0 in those games.

"Salem is impressive," said Marblehead's Lizzy Whitehill. "They're better than they were a year ago. Our coaches gave us a heads up about them."

The Witches kept the heat on Marblehead throughout the contest, but home runs by Kate Fallon and Whitehill and Colantuno's steady pitching enabled the Magicians to pull out a 5-3 victory.

The Magicians were a little shaky in the field, allowing Salem to close the gap to 4-3 in the bottom of the fifth, but coach Johnny Gold has one of the hottest teams in the NEC. Marblehead has won five of its last six and is now 8-3 overall heading into today's home game against Lynn Classical. Yes, it will be Marblehead's fourth game in four days.

"It's a little bit of a strain," Gold said of the compact schedule, "but Courtney is fine and the rest of our kids are fine."

Salem fell to 4-8 with its fifth consecutive loss, but freshman pitcher Sarah Chasse and the Witches pushed Marblehead to the limit with two runs in the fifth. The Magicians threw the ball away following a hit by Salem's Erica Mendez, making it 4-2, and a run-scoring single by Jessica Ngo cut it to 4-3.

Chasse, who has good stuff and demonstrates extraordinary poise for a freshman, did her best to hold Marblehead right there, but Whitehill blasted the first homer of her career in the top of the seventh to expand it to 5-3. The other big hit off Chasse was Fallon's two-run homer in the first inning.

Overall, Marblehead struggled a bit against the talented freshman.

"Sarah pitched well," said Salem coach Dan Bertone. "She kept us in the game. When you can hold a good team like Marblehead to 4-5 runs, you're doing a good job. She didn't hit her spots a couple of times and that's when she got into trouble (allowing home runs).

"The home run by (Whitehill) was big," added Bertone. "I mean, she squares to bunt on the first pitch and then she hits the next pitch over the fence. It's a lot different playing from two runs behind than one run behind. We've got speed on our team and we might've been able to do something with it (in the bottom of the seventh), but you have to play it different when you're two runs down."

Whitehill is a sparkplug-type player for the Magicians. Gold calls her "our dirt dog" because she's willing to play anywhere and will do anything to help the team win, but she's no slugger. She's simply too small to be a slugger. But this time she made the perfect swing and launched the ball over the fence in left, stunning herself as well as her coaches and teammates.

"I gave them the fake bunt (on the first pitch)," said Whitehill, smiling broadly. "I didn't think the ball would go over the fence (on the homer). I got some good advice from my teammates before I hit it."

Gold described Whitehill's celebration as "Hendu-like," a reference to Dave Henderson, who hit a dramatic home run for the Red Sox in Game 5 the 1986 American League playoff against the California Angels.

Meanwhile, Salem had its moments. The Witches sliced the early 2-0 deficit to 2-1 in the third on Susie Barnes' run-producing single, and it had that two-run rally in the fifth. For the most part, Salem was sharp in the field, too.

"I told our kids that if we can play this kind of softball against a team of Marblehead's (high) caliber, we'll be alright the rest of the way," said Bertone. "We've got winnable games left on our schedule. We have to be able to take those games."