Shea’s Torres fires no-hitter against CF

Raiders earn shot at No. 1 E-WG in D-III quarters

PAWTUCKET — The Shea softball team made sure Central Falls didn’t produce a second miracle, seventh-inning comeback at Max Read Field in the simplest way possible.

The Raiders didn’t play the seventh inning. In a Division III first-round contest for the right to face undefeated Exeter-West Greenwich, Shea junior pitcher Ashley Torres fired a complete-game no-hitter to go along with eight strikeouts, and she also hit an RBI double and an RBI triple as part of a three-run afternoon in a 16-3 six-inning victory over the No. 8 Warriors Monday afternoon.

“I don’t know what happened, but I knew I really wanted to win this game,” said Torres, who was on the wrong end of a 12-11 decision last week against the Warriors. “This is a playoff game and we wanted to keep playing. No, I didn’t do anything different from the last game. I always do the same thing.”

“Ashley’s very consistent all the time and she gets the job done,” Shea first-year coach Steve Cooper said. “The difference between the last game and this game is the girls were focused for this one. They weren’t making the mental mistakes to let the other team get back into the game. They limited the errors and they hit the ball pretty well today. We did well.”

Central Falls (6-8 Division III) reached the Division III playoffs for the second straight season after winning a combined seven games from 2014-16.

Monday, catcher Sydney Gibbons reached base three times and scored two runs, while right fielder Lucy Vicente had the team’s lone RBI. Starting pitcher Kelsea Moran was done in by three errors in a six-run first inning and two more in a two-run third inning.

“We played well in the middle of the game, but we just couldn’t get over that initial hump,” Central Falls coach Carmen Ruiz said. “We couldn’t get the ball rolling. I think this game was similar to the last one, but the difference was getting the run in and we couldn’t do that. We knew this was a high-stakes game and some of the girls had the jitters coming in.”

Shea (7-7 Division III) suffered a 16-0 defeat to the Knights in their first meeting at the Linehan School in West Greenwich on April 12. The Raiders, however, committed five errors to help end the game after five innings. Cooper, whose team didn’t commit an error in the last four innings Monday, is confident his squad will play better.

“This group of girls is very special, but we know [today] is going to be a tough game,” Cooper said. “They’re the top team, but if we play the way we can play, we should hold our own. If we hold our own, we should be in the game.”

Central Falls, which served as the home team for the second time at Max Read, made far too many mistakes in the first inning. Sophia Panzo opened the scoring on a Mishayla Culhane double to left and the catcher scored a batter later on a Torres triple.

The Warriors then started to kick the ball around, which allowed Faith Charon (single), Nulka Pagan (error) and Angie Ramirez (walk) to make the score 6-0 before the Warriors hit. Unlike the regular season, Division III teams are allowed to score more than five runs in an inning in the playoffs.

Torres and Charon hit back-to-back RBI doubles in the third to stretch the lead out to eight before Torres ran into trouble. The junior hit three batters in the inning and wound up plunk- ing seven CF batters. Captain Dianna Jimenez was hit and scored on a wild pitch. Gibbons was also hit and scored on a wild pitch.

“We wanted to keep the momentum going after we scored those two runs, but unfortunately we kept stalling on offense,” Ruiz said. “We tried hard to get some runs home. We had no home-field advantage this season, but we made the best of it and made the playoffs for the second straight season.”

Torres only allowed one more run – after hitting Gibbons in the fifth – and the Raiders ended the game an inning early with eight runs in the sixth. Yasmine Santos (walk), Culhane (fielder’s choice), Torres (walk), Charon (RBI walk), Pagan (RBI walk), Ramirez (RBI single), Briana Andrade (RBI single) and Antonette Cooper (RBI walk) all scored. Panzo capped off the inning with a two-run single to center.