Wilmot ends Oak Creek’s softball season.
Hutchinson allows just three hits
MADISON – Wilmot finally found itself in a pitchers’ duel, and Sarah Hutchinson was up to the challenge.
The senior allowed just three hits to outlast Oak Creek’s Becca Oleniczak and help the Panthers score a 2-1 victory over the Knights in the semifinals of the WIAA Division 1 state softball tournament Friday night at Goodman Diamond.
The victory extended the Panthers’ winning streak to 16 games and earned them a spot in the title game at 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Kaukauna beat Stevens Point, 3-0, in the second semifinal.
This will be Wilmot’s first state final since finishing second to Stevens Point in 2011.
“I’m really proud of my girls,” said Hutchinson, whose team improved to 22-4. “They were behind me. We had killer defense today. You can’t have a good pitcher without a good defense. It’s definitely a combined effort.”
Indeed it was. Hutchinson struck out just two batters, and the defense had just one error.
At the plate, Wilmot, which hit 13 home runs in the previous three games, had six hits and didn’t have one fly out of the park. Two hits came from senior first baseman Riley Regnier, who played a role in both the team’s runs. In the seventh, her double to left-center set the stage for the winning run. She moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on another by the tiring Oleniczak.
The victory not only left Wilmot a victory away from its first state title since 1990, but it also extended the Southern Lakes Conference’s string of postseason success. This will mark the fifth time in seven years that a team for the league has reached the state final.
“It’s surreal. The adrenaline rush is really here” Regnier said. “At the beginning of the season, we knew we had to work hard to get to where we are right now and we’ve earned it.”
In order to advance, Wilmot had to come from behind.
Oleniczak helped her cause in the fourth.
In the first inning, the junior hit a towering fly ball out to center. The second time up she sent a smash to center that had plenty of distance to clear the 225-yard marker on the outfield fence. It was her fifth home run of the season.
Wilmot respond quickly. Its next at bat, the team turned an opening single by Hutchinson into the tying run. Hutchinson was replaced by courtesy runner Kenzi Ketterhagen, who stole second and moved to third on a deep sacrifice fly from Regnier.
Ketterhaen scored on a single to short right field by junior Hayli Richards
The key bat in that inning, however, belonged to Regnier, who fouled off seven straight two-strike pitches before launching that sac fly, which seemed to take a little something out of Oleniczak. Regnier was feeling it, too. “I know for a fact that she made me tired, so I give her props for working just as hard out there,” she said.
Oleniczak bounced back and retired three straight batters after allowing a single to open the sixth.
In the bottom of the inning, a one-out error, walk and passed ball left Oak Creek with runners on first and third and the fourth and fifth hitters in the lineup coming to the plate. They came up empty though.
Senior shortstop Katie Mitchell bounced to the third baseman who threw home to get out the lead runner. Freshman catcher Jenna Trewyn then hit a sharp grounder to short that senior Kalyssa Koehn fielded on the bounce and fired to first to end the inning.
That missed opportunity proved costly.
Wilmot plated the go-ahead run in the top of the seventh to end Oak Creek’s best tournament run since 2008. The Knights finished the year 29-2. Both losses came to Wilmot. “Their shortstop and third baseman some incredible plays down the stretch that took some momentum away from us,” Oak Creek coach Jeff Trask said. “They had a few oops hits. But they’re hits. They put the runners on, and at the end they took advantage of Becca just kind of running out of gas.”