BRODHEAD, Wis.—As Brodhead third baseman Leah Rear stepped up to the plate with the bases loaded and two outs she reminded herself to do one essential thing: breathe.
“I really just had to slow my breath down,” the freshman said.
Rear didn’t have to perform the respiratory exercises for too long as she took the first pitch she saw from Beloit Turner pitcher Maddyn Saunders and smashed the ball off the barrel of her bat, sending it over the fence in center field for a grand slam.
“When the ball was coming in, I was like, 'That's right down the middle. I'm taking that thing,’” Rear continued. “And at first I didn't even think it was going over. I was just running and I heard it. And I just kept running.”
The blast was part of a four-run second inning that helped propel the Cardinals past the Trojans 9-3 in Rock Valley Rock play on a sunny and seasonable Tuesday afternoon.
“I’ve actually never hit a grand slam before,” Rear added. “So yeah, it felt really good.”
It was a key moment of a strong offensive outing from the reigning WIAA Division 3 State champions. Brodhead finished with 10 hits from eight different batters, drew seven walks and took advantage of three Turner errors.
“We had a nice hitting night last night against Monroe and it transitioned into tonight,” Cardinals’ head coach Steve Krupke said. “Hitting is never easy, but if you make the pitcher pitch to you and don't swing at their pitches, you have an advantage. If you're chasing the pitches that they want you to chase, you're going to dig yourself in a hole. We were ahead in the count a lot today.”
Brodhead was in an early 1-0 hole when Trojans’ senior Kamdyn Davis smashed a triple to the wall in deep center to start off the game and scored on the next pitch when Sammi Schleis singled on a bunt.
After that, starting pitcher Ava Risum settled in to only allow three more baserunners over the next five innings.
“I was really trying to slow down my motion and work on my spin a lot instead of trying to power it in there,” Risum said. “My curve was really working and so was my rise. And my change up really started to come into play towards the end of the game.”
The Cardinals gave her plenty of support. Saunders walked the first three batters in the bottom of the first and Rear tied it up with a single to right. Jerrica Schwartz put Brodhead ahead for good one out later when her sacrifice bunt scored Jaelyn Hilliard.
Rear’s grand slam made it 6-1 and, in the third, Hillard scored Tessa Kloepping, who had singled, on a sacrifice bunt. Risum smacked an RBI single in the next at-bat to make it 8-1.
Saunders, making her third varsity start, struck out three, walked six, and allowed seven hits and eight runs, but just two of them were earned as the Trojans’ infield was atypically sloppy with the ball.
“It is uncharacteristic,” Turner head coach Brian Maxwell said. “Just a couple little boots. I'm not worried about it at all. We see them in practice and, I know it's not as high pressure, but it's dynamite.”
Lauryn Wells threw two frames of relief and allowed one earned run on three hits.
“Our pitching did fine,” Maxwell continued. “We had some walks, but if we don't implode on defense then we're out of those innings. How do we respond tomorrow? That's going to set the tone.”
And Risum kept the Trojans at bay. She allowed three earned runs on seven hits and a pair of walks while striking out nine.
Four of those hits and two of those runs came in the seventh where Schleis had a two-run single.
“Ava is a competitor and she’s pretty stoic,” Krupke said. “I told her I wanted to work on a couple things. We tried some different things in terms of locations with pitches. If that was a tighter game, I probably would have called the last inning differently. But she threw a heckuva game.”
Risum and Lear each finished with two hits while Turner was paced by Schleis’ two singles.
Turner falls to 2-1 both overall and in conference play while Brodhead continues its hot start by moving to 4-0 and 2-0 in the RVC Rock.
And Krupke added that his squad hasn’t come into the season expecting an easy ride just because they’re the state champions.
“The first night of practice everyone wore their state gear, and then they said they don't want to talk about it anymore,” he said. “I thought that was pretty cool.”
“We're not trying to be too cocky about it,” Risum said. “Yeah, we won state last year, but our conference is coming back pretty strong again this year. We just really want to keep an even head.”
BRODHEAD 9, BELOIT TURNER 3
BT;100;000;2;—;3;7;3
Brodhead;242;010;—;9;10;0
Leading hitters: BT, Davis 1x4, 1 Run; Schleis 2x4, 3 RBI; Meris 1x3, 1 Run; Clark 2x3, Carl 1x3, 1 Run. Brodhead, Leitzen 1x4, 4 Runs; Hilliard 1x1, 1 Run, 1 RBI; Risum 2x2, 1 Run, 1 RBI; Rear 2x3, 1 Run, 6 RBI; Schwartz 1x2, 1 RBI; Ceslok 1x3, Steinke 1x4, 1 Run, Kloepping 1x4, 1 Run.
Pitching (ip-h-r-er-bb-so): BT, Saunders 4.0-7-8-2-6-3, Wells 2.0-3-1-1-1-0. Brodhead, Risum 7.0-7-3-3-2-9.
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