Cardinals make their pitch for Steel Valley supremacy
By Pete Mollica
Mooney freshman Jamie Clausen struck out 10 batters in a 3-1 victory over Ursuline.
BOARDMAN — Mooney High softball coach Mark Rinehart had a difficult decision to make Wednesday before his team’s Steel Valley Conference showdown with Ursuline at the Field of Dreams.
Rinehart decided to go with freshman pitcher Jamie Clausen against the Irish and it turned out to be a pretty good choice.
Clausen (2-1) pitched a three-hitter and struck out 10 batters as the Cardinals (13-2) posted a 3-1 victory over Ursuline (10-3).
“We lost our number one pitcher from a year ago, Chrissy Porter, with a knee injury before the season started and she’s only thrown sparingly this season,” Rinehart said. “Our junior Kelcie Herberger and Jamie have been carrying the load and I decided to go with the freshman today.
“She has a lot of poise for a freshman and she has great velocity,” Rinehart said. “We were going to split up the game with her and Kelcie, but when she started striking out everybody early on, we just let her go the distance.”
Clausen retired the first 11 batters she faced before getting into trouble with two outs in the fourth inning. She walked five.
“I thought I might strike out a few of them, because Ursuline is a good hitting team, but 10 strikeouts was way more than I expected,” Clausen said.
“I really got nervous in the fourth inning when they loaded the bases, but I knew that I had a good defense behind me and I just relaxed and threw hard and we got out of it,” she said.
Ursuline coach Mike Kernan gave credit to the Cardinals.
“They outplayed us today, they deserve the win,” Kernan said. “We had a couple of early errors and they got a couple of hits and it’s a lot easier to play when you’re ahead than behind.”
The Cardinals got on the scoreboard first in the second inning without a hit.
Meghan Williams led off and reached on an error and the overthrow put her on second base.
She moved to third on a groundout and scored on a wild pitch by losing pitcher Casey Lower.
The Irish tied the game in the fourth after Clausen had retired the first two batters. The second out was an outstanding defensive play by Mooney’s second baseman Macy Ucchino, who went into the outfield grass to field Miranda Carkido’s hit and threw her out at first from her knees.
The Irish started to rally as Kasey Foley doubled to center for the first hit off Clausen, then took third on a wild pitch and scored on Nikika Bonamase’s infield single to short.
Ursuline went on to load the bases on two Clausen walks, but she got Lower to hit into a force play to end the inning.
The Cardinals regained the lead in the fourth when Katie Hughes led off with a single to center and Christina Hrehor followed with a single to left.
Williams followed with a single up the middle loading the bases. Herberger then lined out to center and the Irish had Hrehor caught off second base, but the throw went over the second baseman’s head allowing Hughes to score from third.
Mooney added an insurance run in the sixth inning when Williams led off with a home run over the right-field fence.
Williams and leadoff hitter Kristen Stahl each had two hits for the Cardinals, while Clausen doubled. Mary Alexander had the other hit for the Irish.
Lower allowed seven hits while going the route. She struck out two and walked one batter.
mollica@vindy.com