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Tiger girls take out Eagles on opening day, 8-5
Brentsville District sophomore Grace Nordan struck out 11 Liberty batters in Bealeton Wednesday night as the Tigers took out the Eagles 8-5 on opening day for high school varsity softball.
The game marked the first time Brentsville had ever headed the 15 miles down Route 28 from Nokesville and came back with win against the home-team Eagles. The two schools were Group AAA Northwestern District rivals until Liberty moved up to the Group AAA Cedar Run District this school year.
“That’s great,” said Amy Beard, now in her sixth season at the Tigers’ helm. “I know the girls were like, ‘Even though they’re not in our district…’ and I said, ‘I don’t care.’”
Liberty senior Lindi Wakefield (0-1) gave up six runs in the first three innings, five of which came during a monster third inning for the Tigers.
“I told them out there, I said, ‘The thing is, what we need to do, we need to hustle every play,’” Liberty coach Charlie Padgett stated after the game. “There’s a couple things, you know, that should have been handled a little differently. It wasn’t awful but I want us in and out every inning.”
Leading by one with runners on the corners and nobody out, catcher Kaitlyn Barbour laced a double down the left field line that drove in center-fielder Tori Bowley and shortstop Becky Tucker.
Barbour scored two plays later on an Abby Carpenter double to center field. The first baseman and right-fielder Emily Neitzke the both ran home three batters later when Devon Hileman clocked another base-hit off Wakefield, giving Nordan a 6-0 cushion to work with from the rubber.
“That’s a big boost in confidence so Grace and can go out there and be a little more relaxed and there’s not so much pressure on her,” commented Beard. “She did a great job through all seven innings.”
Padgett decided to pull his senior ace after the inning in favor of junior Billie Trussell.
“She didn’t lose confidence (but) they were in the zone right then,” said the eighth-year coach Padgett.
Right-fielder Claire Flinn and catcher Erica Davis led off a mini-Eagle rally in the bottom of the third, smacking back to back singles to center field. Shortstop Danielle Morgan’s RBI shot to center brought in the first Liberty run and, with the bases loaded and only one out, Liberty had a chance to put a dent in the Brentsville lead.
But Nordon (1-0) struck out Bethany Cooper swinging on a 2-2 rise ball, setting up a battle royale with designated player Kendall Aubrey.
Aubrey viciously fought off the Tiger sophomore, fouling five pitching including three balls in a row before finally singling up the middle to center field, driving in Davis and Morgan.
With the bases loaded again two batters later, Nordan managed to work herself out of a jam, striking out second baseman Jessie Huffman on an 0-2 change up that forced Liberty to leave three runners stranded on base.
“From a defensive end, she looked great,” said the Tiger shortstop Tucker, honing in on Nordan’s outing in the early innings.
Facing Trussell in the fourth inning, Tucker gave Nordan another boost when she drove a waist-high, 3-2 pitch over the right-centerfield wall for a solo shot that increased the Tiger lead to 7-3.
“Like, this whole season, I’ve been good with two strikes on me,” said the sophomore. “And I just heard the catcher say, ‘Right there again!’ I wanted to drive it the first time, so you got to take a chance to kill it.”
Eagle batters could not match that same power production, but did manage to manufacture two runs off of Nordan in the bottom of the fourth when Aubrey roped a 2-2 double into left field.
With her team down two runs though, she tried to stretch her hit into a triple, but was tagged out at third base.
Nordan dominated from that point on. Aside from three scattered singles, she mowed down the Liberty line-up before Carpenter scored an insurance run for her in the top of the eighth.
“We were in this game the whole time,” said Padgett. Coming up with an explanation for what went wrong though, all the coach could say was, “I don’t know… gee,” before adding that things just didn’t “go our way.”
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