TONTOGANY, Ohio — The Oak Harbor softball team avenged its lone Northern Buckeye Conference defeat with a 9-1 victory at Otsego on Monday and inched closer to clinching at least a share of the league title in its first year in the conference.
The Rockets (20-2, 10-1 NBC) took advantage of some uncharacteristic miscues by Otsego and rode the pitching of Alyse Sorg to a big league win.
Porter Gregory was 4-for-5 with two RBIs to lead Oak Harbor's offense, which capitalized on two Otsego errors on back-to-back popups to fuel a five-run third inning.
“We capitalized on the two errors there, and then started a rally,” Oak Harbor coach Cami Haas said. “We're really good at that. You say hitting is contagious, but it's really true. Especially with this team and the girls we have. They really want to hit. They attack the first-pitch strike, and you saw that today.”
Leading off the third inning, Myley Sandwisch and Sorg each reached on dropped popups. Reese Adkins then drove both of them home with a two-RBI double. Gregory and Ava Geyer followed with an RBI single and RBI double, respectively, and Allie Giezie wrapped up the scoring in the inning with an RBI single of her own.
Sorg ran into some trouble in the bottom of the third inning when she gave up back-to-back singles to Mackenzie Shirkey and Sabrina Martinez. But Riley Rowe fouled out to Gregory to the first-base side and Gregory gathered and threw a strike to third base to double up Shirkey, who attempted to tag and advance on the play.
“Porter’s play was huge there,” Haas said. “We stress not getting comfortable, no matter what. Anything can happen in this league, and the way it’s played out that’s proved right. [Our players] just continue to go day by day, and every play is a huge play no matter what is on the scoreboard.”
Ryleigh O'Brien then doubled home a run, and after consecutive walks that loaded the bases Sorg shut the door in the inning by getting Cailyn Rider to ground out.
Sorg ended up allowing just one run in her seven innings, scattering seven hits and four walks with six strikeouts.
“I went into the game relaxed because we had already seen them,” Sorg said. “The first time we played them I was kind of on a little bit of a struggle. I've settled down now and I've figured it out and I hit my spots really well today. I didn't do that the first time we played them, and I did that a lot better this time.”
In the top of the fourth, Sandwisch led off with a triple and scored on a sacrifice fly from Sorg.
Gregory added an RBI single in the seventh, and Oak Harbor scored two more on a misplayed groundball off the bat of Geyer.
“[Rowe] pitched me all outside last time and I was pulling them to the third baseman,” Gregory said. “So I was thinking just hit it behind the runner and hit it to right field off those pitches on the outside corner. We needed all the runs we could get and we controlled the game by that.”
Otsego won a 2-1 game at Oak Harbor earlier in the season as the Rockets could not solve Rowe on the mound. This game played out differently mostly because of Otsego's struggles in the field.
“I think for the most part it was pretty similar through most of the game,” Otsego coach Jason Colyer said. “But anytime you give a team extra opportunities —especially a good Oak Harbor team that does a good job of putting the ball in play and forces your defense to work — and if you don't make those plays it's tough to come back from.”
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