Rampage of runs
Lady Rockets ring up 18 in first inning on way to rout of Leechburg
The flood gates broke open early and the runs kept pouring across the plate.
And pouring and pouring and pouring.
Jefferson-Morgan rang up an amazing 18 runs in the first inning on its way to a 18-2, three-inning victory over Leechburg in their WPIAL Class A first-round softball playoff game at Gateway High School on Thursday afternoon.
The fifth-seeded Lady Rockets (15-6) advanced to Monday’s quarterfinals where they will face No. 4 Serra Catholic, which received a first-round bye.
Jefferson-Morgan had a 14-0 lead against the 12th-seeded Lady Blue Devils (2-10) before it made an out in an offensive explosion for the ages that included 15 hits with seven of them going for extra bases.
When asked if he ever witnessed such an inning by any of his teams before, J-M coach Rich Rush responded, “No. But I hope we have more.
“It wasn’t just popups and soft liners that dropped. They were hard-hit balls. It wasn’t one of those days you occasionally have against a certain pitcher where they’re way out ahead of everything. They let it come and they hit the ball and they hit it hard, one through nine today.”
Jefferson-Morgan had 12 hits with at least one from every player in the opening frame.
Emilee Bazzoli, given the day off from her usual pitching duties, went 3 for 3 with a two-run homer and four RBIs, all in the first inning when J-M sent a whopping 22 batters to the plate.
Gabriella Marmie (two doubles, one RBI), Ava Wood (double, single, two RBIs) and Ashlynn Snyder (two singles, one RBI) each had multiple hits in the first inning, which also included a double and three RBIs from Kallyn Novak and a double and an RBI from both Robi Finley and Addyson Teagarden.
The Lady Rockets began the game with three straight singles by Wood, Bazzoli and Snyder and followed that with consecutive doubles by Marmie, Teagarden, Novak and Finley.
“We have a habit of coming out slow against what the girls perceive as weaker teams,” Rush said. “Not today. I mean they came out with purpose. It started from the first batter and it never stopped. It snowballed.”
Rush held back ace pitcher Bazzoli and gave the ball to Marmie, who allowed two unearned runs on two hits with no walks and seven strikeouts.
“Emilee’s had a sore shoulder so I figured this might be an opportunity to give her arm a little more rest and let her hit and play some shortstop,” Rush said. “It worked out perfectly fine and no she gets another three or four days to rest that arm.”
Leechburg’s only hits were singles by Mckenna Puskar and Bianca Linkes and Ava Carrington had one RBI.
Rush discussed how he handled the unusual situation a coach sometimes finds himself in during a lopsided game.
“I always tell my players when I have you in the game, you play hard, in the field and at the plate,” Rush said. “You never go up there trying to make an out. I’ll put in subs and will tell you when we’ll stop stealing and stop going on passed balls, and we were doing that in the first inning.
“But I’m never going to tell a player to not try their best when they’re out there.”
Rush anticipates a much different game against Serra (12-5)on Monday, in more ways than one.
“We’re going to go from like 50, rainy and miserable today to like 88 and sweltering on Monday,” Rush said with a laugh.
“I haven’t seen Serra play. All we know right now is basically what you can get off GameChanger. I do know they’re a tough team and they won their section. I’m expecting them to be very similar to us, good pitching, put the ball in play.”
Rush said he wasn’t worried about the ease of Thursday’s win affecting his players on Monday. The Lady Rockets finished third in rugged Section 2 behind second-seeded Carmichaels and third-seeded West Greene, who both received first-round byes.
“The one nice thing we have going for us is in our section, we get battle-tested,” Rush said.
“You make it through our section, you ran the gauntlet.”