WESTHAMPTON — The Hampshire Regional softball team passed its first big test of 2017 in dominant fashion.
The Raiders defeated Northampton 15-3 on Wednesday afternoon, and only needed six innings to do it. Hampshire (2-0) built a 10-run lead after a seven-run bottom-of-the-sixth inning, forcing the umpires to end the game early.
“We swung the bats very well today,” Hampshire coach Brian McGan said. “Maybe we caught them on a bad day, because that’s a good team, but we went out hacking today, and we got the hits.”
Hampshire was clinging to a one-run lead entering the bottom of the fifth, before finally exploding for eight runs over the next two innings. Northampton pitcher Anna Kerwood (10 runs, 12 hits, one walk, nine strikeouts) was solid early but eventually wore down against the Raiders’ hot bats in her five innings of work.
Pitcher Alana Mohan (innings, two runs, two hits, three walks, two strikeouts) started the game for Hampshire, but began having control issues in the third inning. Emily Halket (three innings, one run, two hits, no walks, two strikeouts) finished the game and recorded the win.
“Emily coming in to shut the door was big for us,” McGan said. “Alana had a little trouble, but we have them both, so we tell them they’re a team, and whatever one of them can’t do, the other one will help. Emily got banged around a little bit when she first came in, but I think that’s the young nerves of both pitchers. They’re both young and a little inexperienced, but from here on, it’s going to help them.”
The game was scoreless until the bottom-of-the-second, when Hampshire’s No. 9 hitter Maggie Rubeck drove in two runs with a two-out single. Leadoff hitter Paige Sullivan then drove in Rubeck with an RBI single before scoring on a double by Danielle McGan to make it 4-0 Raiders.
Northampton struck back with a run in each of the next three innings, including a fifth-inning solo home run for freshman Emilia Pelis, but it was not nearly enough to catch up to Hampshire’s hitters.
Kerwood had shutdown innings in the third and fourth before facing nine batters in the fifth. A walk and an error set up an RBI double for Hampshire’s Brie Bergeron, which was misjudged by the left fielder, who started in and then had to retreat toward the wall. Three RBI singles in the next four at-bats gave Hampshire a comfortable 8-3 lead.
The bottom-of-the-sixth started with back-to-back solo homers for McGan and Katy O’Connor. That marked the end of Kerwood’s day but only the beginning of the onslaught. The Raiders batted around in the inning, scoring seven total runs, including a three-run blast from freshman Hannah Marney that went well over the left field fence. New pitcher Olivia Dubuque faced eight batters and allowed three earned runs, four hits, and a walk. Two batters reached on errors and came around to score.
McGan finished a triple short of the cycle, and recorded her 100th career hit, an RBI single, in the game’s final at-bat.
Northampton struggled at the plate for most of the game, mustering just four hits. Walks and wild pitches by Mohan put several runners in scoring position early, but the Blue Devils failed to find the hits when it mattered.
“We’ve been stressing to be aggressive at the plate,” Northampton coach Andy Pelis said. “Obviously, good things can happen when you swing the bat…we had some chances there, and put up a few runs, but it just wasn’t to be today.”
“They fought hard,” Pelis added. “Unfortunately, our pitcher got tired at the end and we had to pull her, but they didn’t quit, they stayed in it, and believed they were in it the whole time.”
Both teams are back in action Thursday afternoon: Hampshire is at Longmeadow, and Northampton hosts Athol.