Source: Hometown Life
Author: Dan O'Meara
Farmington Hills Mercy hitters produced 21 hits in support of senior pitcher Andrea Elmore to win a Division 1 regional softball tournament for the second straight year Saturday.
The Marlins (40-2) had a dozen of those hits in the championship game as they rolled over Walled Lake Northern in five innings at Novi High School, 11-1.
Elmore was solid and consistent as usual in the circle, scattering seven hits in the doubleheader, which included a 3-0 win over White Lake Lakeland in an earlier semifinal.
She recorded a two-game total of six strikeouts, a low number by her standards, but she issued only two walks on the day and hit one batter.
Furthermore, the senior right-hander got the Knights and Eagles to put the ball in play and allow her capable teammates to make plays in the field.
Mercy’s final hit of the day was senior Abby Krzywiecki’s 20th home run of the season – a solo shot in the fifth inning. The ball hit the plastic covering on the fence in right-center field and bounced over it.
Krzywiecki set a state record for single-season home runs with her 19th in the June 4 district tournament.
She also collected three RBIs in the regional final. She, sophomore Anna Dixon and senior Cari Padula were 2-for-3. Dixon scored three runs, Krzywiecki and Padula two apiece.
Leading 2-1 after one inning, the Marlins put distance between them and the Knights in the final game with a three-run second.
After loading the bases with consecutive singles by Megan Satawa, Mary Reeber and Dixon, Sophie VanAcker followed with a two-double. Another run scored on a fielder’s choice by Krzywiecki.
VanAcker’s double chased starting pitcher Cassie Frankowiak. She and McKenzie Knight, who finished the game, allowed six hits and two walks each. They had not strikeouts.
Mercy broke the game open with a five-hit, five-run fourth inning to which Krzywiecki, Elmore and Shannon Gibbons contributed RBI singles.
The Marlins had loaded the bases again with base hits Krzywiecki and Padula and a fielder’s choice by Nicole Belans that erased VanAcker on a forceout at the plate.
On the single by Elmore, the third baseman threw wild to first base, allowing two more runs to score on the error in addition to the RBI.
The fifth run of the inning was scored by Julia Kleismit, the courtesy runner for Elmore, on a runner interference call on the ball hit by Gibbons.
Padula hit a two-out, RBI double in the first inning and made it 2-0 on a run-scoring single by Belans.
Northern got a run back in the bottom half with Ashley Komosinski’s RBI single, but that was it for the Knights (30-13) as Mercy dominated the rest of the game.
Samantha Harris doubled with two out and scored the Northern run. The only other hit was a fourth-inning double by Casey Maybrier.
The Knights are the first team to score on Mercy in the tournament. The Marlins have outscored their four opponents, 40-1.
The No. 2-ranked Marlins advance to the quarterfinal round of the state tournament and will play sixth-rated Lake Orion at 2 p.m. Tuesday at Wayne State University.