The confidence carried over from The Mary Louis Academy’s thrilling quarterfinal win was still there. The Hilltoppers, like they did when they beat St. Francis Prep earlier in the season, jumped ahead by three runs in the first inning.
“We were really confident coming in, more than we usually are,” senior centerfielder Jill Zic said. “It was a calm, cool and confident kind of approach.”
But as the game went on TMLA’s youth began to show and its momentum slowed. The Terriers tied the score in the third and used a five-run fifth to pull away for an 8-3 win over the Hilltoppers in a CHSAA Brooklyn/Queens softball semifinal at Cunningham Park Thursday.
“Even when they came back and tied the game up the momentum from the big win was still there,” Mary Louis coach Ginny Peiser said. “Once we started to make the errors the youngness came out.”
It wasn’t there in the first inning. Mary Louis (6-9) stringed together four straight hits against SFP ace Katie Derby. Alyssa Paolicelli had an RBI single and sophomore Shannon Minihane, who had two hits, drove in two more to make it 3-0.
Minihane had to leave the game in the sixth after hearing something pop in her left knee trying to scramble back to second. After the game, the SFP players and coaches came to check on her.
The Terriers (11-4) finally got to TMLA starter Rebecca Warne in the third, with help from a wild pitch and a two-run double by Derby that tied the score at 3. The Hilltoppers’ youth then began to show.
Warne, a junior, walked a batter and then hit the leadoff batter in the fifth. With a run already in on a throwing error, reliever Erin Guilfoyle walked the next two hitters to load the bases and had a run score on a throwing error. Briana Franceschini then drove in two with a well struck double and Kristen McGoldrick had a two-run single to make it 8-3. TMLA, which had just three hits after the first inning, also hurt itself with errors.
“That’s pretty much how the season was with that,” Peiser said. “Once that happens we seem to have an implosion inning.”
It wasn’t that kind of a season through. The squad with just three seniors placed last in the Queens division, but won its first game against St. Francis Prep in more than three years. It then scored three runs in the top of the seventh to stun Brooklyn champion St. Edmund in the quarterfinals. Peiser feels they can be a top team next year with players from one of the league’s best JV teams
“It was a great job, especially since were were a young team,” Zic said. “I think we had a really good season.”