Thursday, October 11, 2018

Pioneer Revenge: Kirkwood 6, Webster 5

Sorry this is late. I needed time to decompress, not just from this game but the season – which is kind of still ongoing. Congrats to the varsity for their thrilling 2-1 (10 inning) win over the SJA Angels (who apparently abandoned them) in the first round of the district tournament.
So how much sleep did I lose after this season-ending loss? Well, some, for sure. Lots of “What ifs….” some involving coaching decisions (Might there have been a better order? Should I have walked that #8 batter {who was really the Pioneer #4 who was late to the game} in the bottom of the seventh? Should I have put some pressure on with a couple 1-out bunts?), some involving umpiring (over which I have no control, but when the Kirkwood coach notes on what would have been Strike 3 “that’s been a strike all day [and it had been]” that then turned into a flared windy single by the eventual tying run with 2 out….
Despite Myah King serving as a one-woman wrecking crew (4 for 4 and her fifth shot over the boards into a strong wind), Caitlyn Boyle giving her those runs to drive home, and stalwart pitching from TK, Kirkwood kept creating new paths to tie the score and eventually push across the winning run in one of the most exciting games of the year.
Well, turnabout is fair play and Kirkwood scored two in the bottom of the seventh to erase the run we scored in the top of that inning to regain the lead, ending our winning streak at 10 games and sending us to Serendipity with a final record of 20-2, which looks pretty darn good when you see it in black and white. And if you’d told Coach Cerutti and me in August that we could “settle” for 20-2 or take our chances, I’m pretty sure we would have said we could “settle.”
But we also wouldn’t have wanted to miss this season with these girls, no matter the record. You can look for a season wrap up later this weekend or early next week, but this was my message in the post-mortem and the fitting last words for the last regular blog post of 2018: “I.Love.This.Team.”


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