East Hampton High’s softball team “mercied” Harborfields in both ends of a doubleheader here Saturday, thus clinching a berth in the AA playoffs with a 10-6 record.
Izzie Briand pitched the first game, which ended in the bottom of the fifth inning with the Bonackers up 13-1, and Ella Abran pitched the second, which ended with East Hampton ahead by a like score in the bottom of the sixth.
Pretty much everyone got into the action at the plate, most notably Briand herself, with a ground-rule double that bounced over the center field fence in the first game and a triple in the second contest, Colleen McKee, with a three-run inside-the-park home run in game two, and Alexa Schaffer, with a two-run triple in game one. Lydia Rowan rounded the bases following an outfield error in the second inning of the second game to put East Hampton up 6-0
The team’s coach, Melissa Edwards, demurred when asked about the playoffs following her team’s convincing 7-3 win last Thursday over Hauppauge, a team that had bested the Bonackers in their first two meetings — by a score of 9-6 the first time around, a late-March game in which home runs by Briand, Schaffer, and M.J. Vickers were overshadowed by the fact that East Hampton pitching walked nine.
Briand, a junior transfer from Patchogue-Medford, has greatly improved since then, apparently owing in large part to her Ronkonkoma-based pitching coach, Stephanie Poetzsch-Salzman, a former record-setting Stony Brook University pitcher and coach.
The Bonackers took a 7-1 lead into the final inning of last Thursday’s game, played at the high school’s field. Briand, who finished with nine strikeouts, was lights-out in the first four frames, but struggled a bit thereafter. After she walked the first two batters to face her in the top of the seventh, Abran was brought in to finish up.
Abran retired the first hitter to face her on a flyout to left field. A subsequent nubber in front of the plate loaded the bases, and a sacrifice fly to center enabled the Eagles to plate a run. Two walks followed, resulting in Hauppauge’s third run, but, with the bases loaded again, Abran closed the door, gathering in a soft grounder hit her way and tossing the ball to Vickers at first base.
Vickers, by the way, had been the hero two days before in East Hampton’s 10-5 win at second-place Rocky Point, hitting a two-run home run with two outs in the top of the fifth inning that treated her team to a 6-5 lead. Vickers, who also doubled, went 3-for-4 on the day with four runs batted in, Rowan, the team’s sole left-handed hitter, went 3-for-5 with a triple and two r.b.i.s, and Susie DiSunno, the senior catcher, went 3-for-4.
DiSunno, who has played on the varsity for four years, and her fellow senior, Mackenzie Lenehan, were honored afterward, last Thursday being Senior Day. In the fall, DiSunno is to attend the University of Maryland, where she’ll major in business and minor in musical performance. Lenahan is going to the State University at Oneonta, where she’ll major in childhood education.
Both said softball had been fun this year, and agreed that they’d come together as a team. “It’s all about teamwork,” Lenahan said.
The team was to have played at Eastport-South Manor, the league leader, yesterday, and is to finish the regular season here tomorrow with Westhampton Beach.
