Beal City is off to stellar start
The past week has been a telling week and the week ahead will be telling too.
Last Saturday morning the Beal City High School softball team notched a big-time road victory as the Aggies defeated invite host Holton by a final of 10-4 before besting Rogers City 17-4 to advance to the championship game of the Holton Invite.
Coming into the invite the host Red Devils were ranked second in the state of Michigan in Division 4 while the Aggies carried no ranking whatsoever, thus the 10-4 win was a bit of an upset.
In the championship game the
Aggies fell to 10th-ranked Mendon 10-7, yet showed well against some excellent pitching.
One year removed from winning a share of the Highland Conference crown and closing the season with a record of 27-12 the Aggies return everyone from a season ago and, to date, have played like the experienced team they are.
“We return everybody and have added a few new players, we’re a talented team,” said Beal City head coach Jason Johnston, whose Aggies improved to 5-2 overall Monday via a home sweep of Gladwin. “We have rock-solid hitters one through nine, a lockdown defense and some really good pitching options. We have big goals.”
On paper the Aggies return five all-conference players and a couple All-staters in junior shortstop Emily Taylor and junior pitcher Macy Johnston. Add in a line-up that can thump one through nine and a pitching staff that features five to six legitimate arms led by an All-stater and the end result is optimism, lots of optimism.
Whether this optimism continues to shine brightly will be tested in the coming week and weeks though as the Aggies host Clare on Thursday and Mt. Pleasant Sacred Heart on Monday. As it stands Clare is ranked 10th in Division 3 while Mt. Pleasant SHA is ranked third in D4. Addition