High school softball: Enterprise wins fourth state title in convincing fashion

Six straight championship appearances are hard, and winning four of those six is even more impressive.

Enterprise has now done just that after defeating the No. 6 seed Beaver 8-3 for the fourth time this season on Saturday to claim the 2A title.

Heading into the game, you could say that Enterprise knows how to handle Beaver on the diamond, and it has now won 35 games in a row against the Beavers. The last Wolves loss against Beaver came on April 11, 2008, 5,874 days ago.

With Saturday’s win, Enterprise has now won back-to-back championships, and all four of the school’s softball state titles have come since 2019. Additionally, the Wolves have appeared in all of their classification’s state championship games since 2017.

“We came into the program six years ago,” Enterprise coach Katye Jones said. “Not many people knew who we were. We were move-ins to Enterprise, and they just took a chance with us to be able to take that one last step.

“Ever since we have been here, we have had great support. I mean, the whole town came out for this game. Everyone believes in us, what we do. We are very disciplined, and we make them work their butts off and believe in it. They believe in each one of us and each of the players.”

Beaver opened the scoring in the top of the first inning, but as was the case multiple times Saturday, every time Beaver was able to score, Enterprise was able to immediately answer with some runs of their own.

The Wolves scored two runs in the bottom of the first to take the lead and then one in the third after Beaver tied the game up at 2. After the third inning, however, it was all Enterprise.

Thanks to a double by Addi Nelson, the Wolves extended the lead to 4-2 and then added three more runs in the fifth inning, thanks to hits from Trystin Jolley and Macee Staheli.

Beaver was able to tack on another run in the top of the sixth inning to trim the lead to four, but it was not enough, as the Wolves were able to recover the run in the bottom of the sixth and go on to win the game 8-3.

Blakelee Christiansen was clutch yet again for Enterprise. Pitching in her fourth straight 2A championship game and winning the third title of her career, Christiansen went the full seven innings, allowing six hits and collecting four strikeouts while allowing just the three earned runs.

“Its crazy to think I have been able to be in this game four straight years,” she said. “It feels more stressful every time, but I knew my team was there to back me up, and if I messed up, I knew I didn’t need to worry because they were there helping me every step of the way.”

“It felt so good to get that last strikeout today, I can’t express the feeling, just that each one got better and better.”

Enterprise was hoping to be able to send its senior class off with a third championship.

“We have five seniors. It’s most of our infield, so it was huge having that experience in the field and they were able to step up to the plate and they knew that how they wanted their season and their careers to end and they were able to accomplish that,” Jones said.

The Wolves faced the Beavers twice in the tournament and twice in the regular season, winning all four games. They were able to leave no doubt that they were the best 2A softball team all season long.