JAY – There was really no easing into the regular season Friday for the Jay softball team.
With little to no outside practice this season, the Tigers kicked the season off against a quality Lisbon team that has as much talent, experience and expectations as the Tigers themselves.
“That’s a good team,” Jay coach Robin Roberts said. “They have some good ballplayers. Their shortstop and third baseman are really good. They’re class B, and they’re good. They have a very nice team.”
Jay broke open a scoreless game against the Greyhounds with a run in the fourth and five more in the fifth. It led to a 6-2 victory for the Tigers.
“They’re definitely a good team to open up with,” senior shortstop, Brittany DiPompo said. “Usually we don’t open up with anybody good. The last couple years that we’ve opened up with them, they’ve been a good challenge for us. This starts us off, and we got some hits going.”
Alexi Deering had three hits for the Tigers. Ashley Quirrion had a pair of hits, scored two runs and drove in another, while DiPompo plated a pair.
Both Jay and Lisbon were playoff squads last spring. Both are expected to return to the postseason and be among the stronger teams in the MVC this year.
“Most of our lineup, like Brittany, Beth (Moore) and Alannah (White), they’ve been four-year varsity players,” Roberts said. “They’re starting to shine right now.”
Jay pitcher Paula Despres was masterful, allowing two hits for the first six innings. Lisbon scored its two runs with three hits in the seventh. Despres struck out three and walked none.
“Paula has come a long way,” Roberts said. “She’s a junior. She pitched most of last year. She practices and practices and will go out there and throw strikes.”
Despres was helped by a solid Tiger defense. White, in right field, was a standout, throwing out two runners at first and making a sliding catch in foul territory.
Lisbon had a pair of hits from catcher Haley Eck and third basean Shauna Riordan.
“We walked in three runs, and we were too late on the hitting,” said Lisbon coach Terri Trudell. “Five innings without getting many hits and when we got hits, things happened. It’s just a matter of getting more aggressive at the plate.”
Despres and Lisbon’s Kimber Morse cruised through the batting orders for the first three innings. Jay had some runners, stranding two in the second and two in the third.
“We had a chance to get some runs early,” Roberts said. “We had runners on base, and they made a couple good plays.”
In the fourth, Morse struggled to throw strikes. She walked four straight and failed to get out of the inning with two outs. DiPompo drew a bases-loaded walk to score Quirrion for the first run.
In the fifth, there were three more walks and a couple of wild pitches as the Tigers scored five runs on three hits.
“She just said it was losing her release point,” Trudell said of Morse. “She figured it out for the last few innings. It was just that one inning when they scored five runs that killed us.”
An Ashley Dorey double and an error made it 2-0. Quirrion followed with an RBI single. DiPompo singled in a run with a hit off shortstop Brooke Lawrence’s glove to make it 4-0. White walked in a run, and Moore later scored on a wild pitch.
“We definitely started off slow,” DiPompo said. “We hadn’t practiced out here yet, so it was definitely a challenge getting out here and trying to bat around. She was giving us pitches, but we weren’t converting at all. Once she started walking people, we started running the bases. That’s what we like to do.”
Lisbon broke the shutout in the seventh. A Harmon single and an error allowed Riordan to score. Then, Eck followed with an RBI single.
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