Wood softball stays unbeaten with win over Handley

By JERRY HOLSWORTH | Special to The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER — Neither occasional showers nor two thunder delays could cool off the James Wood softball team.

The Colonels improved to 11-0 with a 13-2 Northwestern District romp in five innings against Handley on Thursday.

Although the Judges (4-7) put up a spirited effort, they struggled to hit Colonels starter Lauren King and made several critical errors.

The miscues helped James Wood score four runs in the bottom of the first and the Colonels were never threatened from there.

“I was very proud of our girls,” Wood coach Todd Baker said. “We jumped out early on them. We always want to have an early start like that. We’ve struggled doing that this year. We’ve kept teams in the game far longer than we should.”

Courteney Harper got things started for Wood in the first scoring on a pair of errors. She advanced to third on fly ball to right that was misplayed, then scored after the throw sailed by the Judges’ third baseman.

Emma Van Horn followed with a single to left center field, stole second and reached third on a wild pitch that also put Lindsey Anderson on first with a walk. Another fielding error by the Judges scored Van Horn, sent Anderson to third and King, the batter, to second. Lani Spielman followed with a sacrifice bunt that scored Anderson and King scored on a sacrifice fly to center by Rebecca Boone to give Wood a 4-0 lead.

After King struck out four of five Handley batters in the second and third innings, the Judges answered in the fourth. Linsey Martin’s double to right plated one run and Qiana Wedlock drove in another with a single.

“Hats off to Handley and the players and coaches,” Baker said. “They’ve really improved as a program. They got some good hits off a really good pitcher today. They played really well.”

King mostly dominated, giving up four hits while striking out nine Handley batters and walking only one.

Wood broke loose in its final two innings.

Boone reached on an error to lead off the fourth against Meghan Stokes. Camryn Rizzari sent Boone to third on a single to left and advanced to second on the throw to third. After Haley Kaiser walked to load the bases, Alyssa Brown scored Boone on a single up the middle. Harper’s sacrifice fly to right scored Rizzari. Kaiser came home on a passed ball and Brown scored on a wild pitch to put Wood up 8-2. Van Horn advanced to first on an error, and scored later in the inning on a sacrifice fly by Anderson to put Wood up 9-2.

“I’ve played with Meghan (Stokes) in travel ball so I knew her pitches,” Van Horn said. “It is just amazing to be 11-0. I just love this team, and I’m very proud of them.”

The Colonels finished off the Judges with four runs in the fifth. Like the previous inning, the bottom of the order got things started.

Rizzari singled to right and Afton Sykes walked to put runners at first and second with one out. After Stokes got a strikeout, Harper walked to load to bases. Van Horn followed with a single to left-center field that scored Rizzari and Sykes. Anderson then sent a single to left center field that plated Harper and Van Horn to end the game.

Martin went 2 for 2 to lead Handley at the plate. Stokes and Wedlock had the other hits.

Stokes allowed 13 runs on six hits and was hurt by five errors behind her.

“Obviously, James Wood is a great team,” Handley coach David Stokes said. “We wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to play against a really good team. I thought our girls did well overall. We just made too many errors.”