West Greene eliminated by Mt. Alvernia, 10-0
BURGETTSTOWN — After a couple of delays, first-round WPIAL girls’ Class A softball playoff action got under way Wednesday. Unfortunately for West Greene, as quickly as the season resumed, it was over, as Mt. Alvernia breezed to a 10-0 victory at Hillman Park in Burgettstown.
The Lady Lions (17-2) pounded out 15 hits and scored in five of the six innings played en route to their 11th consecutive win.
The Lady Pioneers (11-9) had their seven-game winning streak snapped, ending the 2010 season for the very young West Greene squad.
West Greene reached base in all six innings, but couldn’t extend its offense and get runs in, as they had seven runners left on base. Also, four out of the five Pioneers hits came with two outs.
“You have to play your best ball in the playoffs, and today I felt like we laid an egg,” West Greene coach Billy Simms said. “I hate to sound like I’m disappointed in the girls, but they are disappointed in themselves. We didn’t play our best ball, there’s no way around that, and give credit to Mt. Alvernia.
“We had a runner on every inning, but we either missed the sign or didn’t get the bunt down, which is very uncharacteristic of us. It wasn’t a good start for us with the bats, but we are young and we were not intimidated by them.”
Mt. Alvernia made hay out of its chances and scored seven of its 10 runs with two outs already recorded.
In the second, the Lions scored first when Kelsey Hackett drove an RBI triple past the center fielder who was playing in. Hackett had three hits, and they all drove in runs.
The Lions added another run in the second and then tacked on three in the third, a run in the fourth, three more in the fifth and a final run in the bottom half of the sixth to end the game on the 10-run rule.
Ashley Crnkovich picked up the complete game, shutout by pitching six innings, scattering five hits with six strikeouts and two walks.
Paige Moninger took the loss for the Pioneers in her first career WPIAL playoff game as a pitcher. Moninger looked composed early on and was throwing strong, but the Lions were able to get the clutch hit when they had to and had a lot of balls drop in holes in the Pioneer’s defense.
“Paige got a lot of strikeouts against a good team and handle them good the first couple of at-bats,” Simms said. “We kind of missed a couple of plays on defense and they got the hits when they had too. She’s only a sophomore, and she is going to learn from this and build off of this for next year.”
Moninger finished her day by pitching into the sixth, allowing 10 runs on 15 hits with seven strikeouts and only one free pass.
Kayla Cook had two out the five West Greene hits.
Mt. Alvernia now plays section foe Leechburg in the second round of the playoffs.