Lenox Edges Hoosac Valley to Reach State Semi-Final

ADAMS, Mass. – The Lenox softball team Saturday grabbed a 3-0 lead in the top of the first.

 

And ninth-grader Cassidy Flynn made sure the Millionaires never let it go.

 

Flynn scattered five hits in a complete-game effort in the circle as Lenox upset top-seeded Hoosac Valley, 3-2, in the quarter-finals of the Division 5 State Tournament.

 

Flynn also helped her cause with a double and an RBI in the game-winning rally as No. 5 Lenox earned its second straight road win in the tournament and advanced to meet second-seeded Maynard in the Final Four on a date to be announced.

 

After the Hurricanes answered Lenox’s opening salvo with two runs of their own in the bottom of the second, Flynn held the high-powered Hoosac Valley offense scoreless for five straight innings, allowing a total of just five hits against a Hoosac team that had scored in double digits in eight straight games entering the day and that scored 18 in a win over the Millionaires when the teams met at Russell Field on May 1.

 

“They’re a good hitting team, so they were going to get a couple of runs,” Flynn said. “But we stayed up, and our energy was up, and we pulled through.

 

“I was more focused on my spin and making sure my screw and curve were working to keep them off balance. And it worked. And my infield had my back.”

 

Lenox, which committed seven errors in a Western Massachusetts championship game loss just two weeks ago, had just one miscue on Saturday.

 

“We’ve been drilling these girls in practice, especially with infield, because we had so many errors,” Lenox coach Amy Pires said. “I think after Western Mass, we had 64 errors and 52 of them were from the infield. So we’ve been really working on our infield, just drilling those balls and telling them to stay down, trap it … and it’s worked.”

 

For a game that ended with five runs, it started out looking like the offenses would carry the day.

 

Evelyn Julieano, Grace Julieano and Flynn each singled to start the top of the first, and Lexi Witherell doubled to give Lenox a 3-0 lead.

 

Hoosac Valley’s Gracelyn Wright recovered to get three straight outs and went on to strand eight runners the rest of the way to hold the Millionaires at three runs.

 

Her offense, meanwhile, got untracked in the bottom of the second.

 

Genevieve Lagess doubled down the third base line and was safe at third on a play that allowed Rachael Wnuk to reach on a fielder’s choice. Lagess came home on Hannah Lord’s RBI single, and with runners at the corners, Lord and Mackenzie Biros (running for catcher Wnuk) executed a delayed double steal to make it 3-2.

 

But that was the end of the scoring for either team – a fact that was particularly surprising for a Hoosac Valley offense that averaged 15.5 runs per game in going 20-0 going into Saturday and had been held in single digits just twice this spring, once in a 6-2 win at Lenox back on April 9.

 

“I’ve told [my players] many times during the season, if any team in Berkshire County can get down four, five, six runs and have confidence it can come back, it should be us,” Hoosac Valley coach Mike Ameen said. “We were down three runs at the most and down one run for the last five innings.

 

“To think we wouldn’t get at least one run is unusual, and that’s why I tip my cap to Lenox. I don’t know what happened there. After I get home and analyze the game, I’ll maybe figure something out, but they obviously did stop us from scoring runs.”

 

In the fourth, Lenox right fielder Tessa Soules came in on a ball that was dropping for at least a single and made a scooping catch to keep the bases empty. In the seventh, Evelyn Julieano popped up from behind home plate and caught a popup in foul territory for the first out of the inning.

 

Wright got some strong plays behind her as well. In the third, third baseman Izabela Tatro threw out a runner from her knees to end the inning with two runners in scoring position. In the fifth, second baseman Ella Bissaillon made a great play going back on a fly ball over her head and Wnuk caught a foul popup while running into the backstop.

 

It all added up to a tense day for the players and fans who ringed Russell Field and a happy ending for the Millionaires.

 

“We were so happy just to make it to the finals of Western Mass,” Lenox senior Grace Julieano said. “And after losing that, we just kept on it. We kept practicing really hard, working on little things that we needed to work on. And it ultimately paid off.”