(Amesbury) The numbers are mind boggling!
Amesbury (12-0) has now scored 158 runs and given up 3 runs.
This afternoon they mercy-ruled Pentucket, 21-0.
Pentucket, which is now 6-7, had been in every game until today.
“They are obviously an unbelievable team,” said Pentucket coach Deb Smith afterwards. “They hit 1-9. We’re never going to face a team like this again.”
Today was Senior Day for Amesbury’s four seniors: Liv DeLong, Alana DeLisle, Olivia Levasseur, and Ella Bezanson.
“I started watching them when they were eighth graders on our freshman team,” recalled Amesbury coach Jacqui Waters. “They are all great players.”
There will be next-level softball for all four of them. Liv will be at Boston University while the other three are headed for Southern Maine.
“We’ve been together since third grade,” said Liv. “Senior Day is a bit sad but we’re all going on to play some more. We’ll leave behind a lot of memories, though.”
In this game, all the Amesbury players had at least one hit and scored at least one run. Eight players in the lineup had RBI.
“We hit the ball hard,” said Coach Waters.
Amesbury sent eleven batters to the plate in the first inning and collected six runs on seven hits.
Amesbury’s most productive inning was the third in which fifteen batters came up and totaled nine runs on ten hits.
“We were hitting the gaps today,” said Ella Bezanson. There were nine extra-base hits.
The most celebrated hit for Amesbury was in the fourth inning when Olivia Levasseur cleared the fence in left.
“It’s exciting running the bases and seeing the crowd at home plate,” said Olivia. “It was like a dream come true.”
“I knew it was gone because I hit it a certain way,” she added. This was Olivia’s second home run of the season.
Easily lost in all the hitting, was the effective pitching of Alana DeLisle.
The game was over after Pentucket batted in the fifth inning but Alana had enough time to record twelve strikeouts.
“I threw some curves today,” said Alana. “I did what Ella (her sister, the catcher) told me to do.” Alana also made a nice diving catch of a short popup between the mound and home plate.
Pentucket did get two hits off Alana. Nikki Mitchell lined a single to center in the first inning while teammate Meg Hamel singled sharply to left in the fourth inning.
Ella Bezanson paced Amesbury scoring four times. Alana DeLisle led Amesbury with four hits (three doubles and a single). Olivia Levasseur was tops in RBI with five.
“We’re moving on,” said Coach Smith. “We’ll put this game behind us.”
A food truck was available as part of the post-game Senior Day festivities. I’ll admit I was tempted.
I was badly fooled by the weather. I have had straight days requiring multi-layers. Today it was sunny with no wind. It felt good!
Pentucket 0 0 0 0 0 = 0
Amesbury 6 2 9 4 – = 21
(The pictures will enlarge.)
McClelland Miscellanea 