Expectations weren’t exactly soaring for Cape Fear softball after last season’s third-round playoff exit.
The Colts were just two years removed from an East Regional finals appearance, but eight players from that squad had played their last game at Doris Howard Field. Among them was three-year starting pitcher Lex Glemaker, set to embark on a college career at Newberry after ranking among the NCHSAA’s top five in wins with 22 in her senior season.
The Colts didn’t have big numbers turn out for tryouts. They didn’t have the league’s best hitter, Noni McFadden, behind the plate anymore. And they didn’t have a great start, losing two of their first three games this season.
What they did have, coach Jeff McPhail recognized midway through the challenging season, was a stubborn tenacity that wouldn’t settle for lowered expectations.
“They had grit in ‘em, man. Just grit,” McPhail said after Cape Fear’s NCHSAA playoffs third-round loss to Havelock on Thursday. “They had the grit, they had determination.
“Going into the year, we just didn’t quite know how we were going to be a .500 club or whatever, but we just kept on getting better and better and better.”
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After a 5-8 start, the Colts (18-6) reeled off eight straight wins – two of them coming in rematches against teams they’d lost to earlier in the season.
There was a two-game hiccup in late April with back-to-back losses to close the season, but Cape Fear rebounded with a three-game run to the United 8 Conference tournament championship and captured the crown behind a three-hit shutout from Olivia Melvin to go with three hits and the game’s only run scored by Allie Dawson.
A No. 9 seed in the 3A East, the Colts beat West Johnston 3-0 as Melvin pitched the shutout and delivered a home run and double for two RBIs in the first-round win. Then, they traveled to Triton and upset the Hawks 6-2 in Round 2 as Melvin homered and tossed 13 strikeouts while Dawson and Kayleigh Brewington added an RBI apiece.
Thursday’s third-round game was delayed two days due to storms while Cape Fear awaited Havelock, a No. 16 seed that had knocked off No. 1 Scotland. When first pitch finally arrived, Melvin admits the thought of playing her last game for Cape Fear crept in, but she settled quickly, drawing two outs on her first two pitches and then the first of her 12 strikeouts on the night.
“It’s very special because no one expected us to get this far but we showed out and we played Cape Fear softball,” she said.
Melvin has already signed to play volleyball at Mount Olive next year, but last summer she stepped up for the softball squad.
“At the end of the year, she came up and said, listen, I’ll help out with pitching next year. And, man, she ran with it,” McPhail said.
“For someone not to pitch for two years and come in and do what she’s done, she’s a great leader. She has grown up.”
Melvin’s Cape Fear career is decorated with four years of all-conference volleyball (three of them first-team). She’s a two-time Best of 910Preps Volleyball Player of the Year, two-time all-conference softball (with one honorable mention), first-team all-state volleyball and U8 Conference player of the year in two sports.
“She wanted it. She’s incredible,” McPhail said. “I’ve had her and her sister, that family, for eight years. I hate to see them go.”
Melvin’s sister Taylor batted .547 for McPhail’s 23-2 conference champion team in 2019, and their mother Kelly is the school’s volleyball coach.
The youngest Melvin blasted 14 home runs this season to rank second in the state. Her 50 RBIs also rank No. 2 statewide and her 1.15 ERA is No. 23. That two-way domination earned her the league player of the year award – a symbol of her value and surely appreciated, but not nearly as meaningful as sharing a surprise tourney title and third-round run with her teammates and coaches.
“It’s my senior year,” she said. “I’m going to give it my best for my team.”
Melvin struck out 13 batters Thursday, but Havelock’s Elana Krupey allowed just three hits. And the Colts left bases loaded twice while the Rams’ bats were timely. Addison Jones brought home a runner from second with a double in the second inning, and she scored in the fourth after singling to left, stealing second, and crossing the plate on Chole Schreckengost’s looper to center.
Briana Wilson, Avery Jones and Dawson had hits for Cape Fear, but the Colts couldn’t solve Krupey, who carried 150 strikeouts into the game.
“No negative about what we did tonight,” McPhail said. ”I’m just so proud of what they’ve done because we just didn’t know what it was going to be at the beginning of the year.
“They just knew they had to pull together and make this thing work, and that’s what happened.”
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