Seasoned NC softball hands youthful Licking Valley its first loss

On Apr 5, 2023

NEWARK ― Newark Catholic softball starts nary a senior, but two years ago, its strong group of juniors played in the Division IV state tournament as freshmen.

After a disappointing 2022, the Green Wave is putting its experience to good use this spring, and it showed Tuesday at home against an unbeaten, but young Licking Valley team. Solid pitching by Avery Nagel, backed by stellar defense and Kami Diaz’s two-run homer, produced a 3-1 Licking County League crossover win that doubled last year’s win total in the conference and pushed NC’s record to 4-1.

“You have to remember. We only won one league game last year,” co-head coach Devani Adam said after her club ran its LCL-Cardinal Division mark to 2-0. “We lean on our core group of junior girls for leadership, but we also have some young talent.”

“We’re definitely expecting big things,” said Nagel, one of those juniors, who scattered six hits, struck out two and walked three. “With our experience and competitiveness, we’re going to win more LCL games and hopefully go farther in the tournament,” she said. “We really want it this year.”

The game started out as a potential slugfest, but turned into a low-scoring defensive struggle as only one error was committed, despite several hard-hit balls.

Valley speedster Sylvie Devore led off the game with a single and promptly stole second, and Zoey Shaw walked. Abbe McNabb lined an RBI single to right, but NC catcher Ava Heffley then threw out Shaw stealing third, and Nagel limited the damage to a run by getting Liz Korns to fly to center.

The Green Wave quickly answered, as freshman Veronica Bailey doubled to right and Diaz lined her third homer over the left-centerfield fence for a 2-1 lead. It turned out to be enough for Nagel and NC’s defense. In the third, Bailey’s twin in left, Joanna, made a diving grab of Shaw’s liner. In the fourth, Korns singled to right, but Addi Gerber threw her out trying to stretch it into a double. In the sixth, a charging Veronica Bailey at third speared Devore’s bunt attempt for a hit. In the sixth, Taylor Penick and McNabb had back-to-back, two-out hits, but Korns flew to right.

“That’s something we’ve been doing, getting two-out hits, but we weren’t able to today, and that’s a credit to them,” said Panthers’ coach Chad Dennis after his team slipped to 3-1, 2-1. “We had some hard-hit balls early against her (Nagel), but then she settled in. They made a lot of really good plays, in the infield and running down balls in the gaps.”

“I knew I had that defense behind me, and they did an amazing job,” Nagel said. “I was able to mix things up, get serious and still have fun.”

Adam had to give Nagel a bit of a pep talk after the first inning.

“She pitched a great game, but coming into the dugout after that inning, she said, ‘coach, my pitches aren’t working well.’ I told her to just stay with it, that her defense had her back. Then she starting hitting her spots and using her off-speed. And our outfield play was huge.”

The winners added a big insurance run in the fifth, when Heffley doubled to center and scored on Veronica Bailey’s single to right. Diaz then had her second hit, but Valley sophomore southpaw Rylee Pitt induced flyouts by Kylie Gibson and Maris Knowlton. Knowlton and Nagel doubled for NC, but Pitt stranded both at second. She gave up seven hits, fanned five and walked only one.

“We’re young,” said Dennis, who starts five sophomores and a freshman. “We have a lot of inexperience, all over the field. We’ll have our ups and downs, but we’re doing really well.”

Diaz, an outstanding junior shortstop, noted that the Green Wave starts two sophomores and two freshmen, in addition to the five juniors. But NC is not your typical young team.

“Our defense and pitching will get the job done, and our lineup has hard hitters, every batter. One through nine, there are no weak spots,” Diaz said. “We have a new attitude this year, and we really back each other up. We expect to have a good season, but it’s one pitch, one play, one game at a time. We don’t want to look to the future too much.”