The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Mercy comes up short
SHA, Woodland rally to advance to finals
MERIDEN — After the final out settled into the glove of teammate Michaela Troy, Sacred Heart Academy pitcher Anna Fagan’s reaction was quick and to the point. “Oh my God, we did it!,” Fagan shouted. Trailing by three runs late, SHA rallied for seven in the final two innings to defeat Oxford, 7-4, in the Class M semifinals at the Dunn Sports Complex in Meriden on Tuesday. The 18th-seeded Sharks (17-8) will face top seed Woodland (25-1) for the state championship on Saturday at UConn’s Burrill Family Field. Woodland also overcame an early 3-0 deficit to win 8-3 over Mercy in the late semifinal. SHA is making its fifth appearance in the final and its first since 2014, and Woodland is the defending state champion.
Rallying from a deficit against Oxford pitcher Shay Webb, who had thrown consecutive no-hitters in the second round and quarterfinals, wasn’t easy.
But SHA coach Maegan Onofrio said her team has never felt daunted.
“That’s exactly who they’ve been all season, they never give up,” Onofrio said. “We’ve been down a couple of big games, but they stick together. They keep the energy up and they’re great teammates to each other. That was huge today.”
The Sharks delivered a five-run fifth to take the lead. Anne Plunkett led off with a single and Ayva Caruso following with an RBI double off the centerfield fence.
After a groundout, Caruso scored on a single by Alyssa Norton. Michaela Troy and Brooklyn Sigmon followed with base hits to load the bases and an infield error allowed two runs to score, giving SHA a 4-3 lead. The fifth run scored on a passed ball.
Oxford got one run back in the bottom of the sixth when Madison DeSombre hit her second double of the game and then scored on a sacrifice fly by Lia Ward.
A two-out, two-run single by Michaela Troy in the seventh gave the Sharks some breathing room and Fagan worked around a two-out single in the home half of the inning to end the game.
“This is kind of insane,” Fagan said with a smile. “I don’t really have words for this. I’m just proud of my teammates. Personally, I just focused on getting outs, and getting my teammates back to the dugout so they could focus on getting hits and scoring runs.”
In the late game, Woodland pitcher Sammy Sosnovich delivered another stellar performance. She struck out 13 and allowed three hits in the Hawks’ victory over Mercy.
Sosnovich overcame a shaky first inning, when she hit two batters, walked two and surrendered three runs. But she went into lockdown mode the rest of the way. At one point, Sosnovich retired 11 straight before walking a batter in the top of the sixth.
The Hawks, ranked No. 5 in the GameTimeCT Top 10 Poll, had won 49 straight games before losing to Oxford, 3-0, in the NVL final. They’ve now won three state games in a bid for a repeat title.
“We didn’t want to lose that (NVL final), we don’t like the feeling of losing,” Sosnovich said. “So we knew we had to
buckle down, figure out our stuff and get it back together.”
The Hawks amassed 10 hits, including a 4-for-4 performance from sophomore Ella Van Alstyne, who had two doubles and two RBIs, and scored twice, including a run in the bottom of the first.
The big inning for the Hawks was the fifth, when they scored three runs on three hits to take the lead. Rowley and VonAlstyne started the frame with back-to-back doubles to tie the score, and the next two runs scored on an error and an RBI single by Paige Chiaramonte.
“There’s a drive to hit good pitches and a drive to make the most of every at-bat,” Woodland coach Loren Luddy said, “Every single at-bat in every single game counts and that’s been a point of emphasis.”
And that has led to a return trip to the state final and a possible repeat championship.
“It’s fantastic,” Luddy said. “It’s really, really great. I only have four upperclassmen, so it’s exciting with the younger kids. I’m really happy for them and for Sam, she really buckled down and got the job done with the bat and on the mound.”
Sacred Heart Academy 7, Oxford 4
SHA .................. 000 005 2 — 7 11 0 OXFORD ............. 030 001 0 — 4 7 1 Batteries: SHA — Anna Fagan (W, 5Ks) and Adrianna Ramos; O — Shay Webb (L, 11Ks) and Scarlett Formato; 2B: SHA — Ayva Caruso, O — Madison DeSombre 2, Olivia Garcia.
Woodland 8, Mercy 3
MERCY ............... 300 000 0 — 3 3 1 WOODLAND ..... 110 033 x — 8 10 0 Batteries: M – Brooke Hickman; W – Sammy Sosnovich and Julia Rowley. 2B: M — VanAlstyne (2), Rowley, Sosnovich; 3B: M – Lucia Rubano