By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
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EASTAMPTON — Walk-off wins in baseball or softball usually come in dramatic fashion, with a player lacing a single up the middle to score a runner from third, or a double into the gap that chases a speedy base runner home from first as the winning run scores with a dust-filled slide into home plate.
On Tuesday afternoon at the Rancocas Valley High School Athletic Complex, host Rancocas Valley scored a 3-2 walk-off victory over Cherokee with a pair of bunts that didn’t even reach the pitcher’s circle. It wasn’t the most thrilling way to win a ball game — on two overthrows of first base after a couple of bunts — but the Red Devils will take it, as they improved to 7-2 while knocking off a team that entered the state’s Top 20 rankings last week.
“Our girls always respond when they come out against Cherokee,” said Red Devils coach Alexis D’Amico. “There’s something about it, they seem to have a chip on their shoulder. A lot of them are friends, they play travel ball together, they know each other.”
Allie Uhlig reached on a throwing error to start the bottom of the seventh in a 2-2 tie, and moved up to second base on the errant throw. A couple of pitches later and the game was over, as sophomore shortstop Payton Schwartz dropped down another bunt, and again the throw was wide of first. Uhlig trotted home with the winning run as the Red Devils (7-2, 3-0 Olympic American) handed the Chiefs their third loss in the last four games. All three of Cherokee’s losses this season have been by one run.
Cherokee senior catcher Kasey McNee blasted a game-tying solo home run in the top of the seventh to keep the Chiefs alive, but RV pitcher Molly Doppler worked out of further trouble when third baseman Emily Spiegler turned a nifty 5-3 double play. Doppler worked out of several other jams throughout the game, including stranding two runners each time in the second, fifth and seventh innings and wiggling out of a bases-loaded pickle in the top of the third.
“Molly is great. Her change-up is nasty. Nobody can hit that change-up, and if they do it’s a blooper to the outfield,” said senior center fielder Ava Sweet.
“I don’t like to get nervous because I know that even if they hit it, I have my team backing me up. My team made some pretty good plays. You just have to stay calm (in tough situations) and work through it. I like to take it slow. I know I’ve been in tough situations before and I’ve gotten out of them before,” said Doppler, who came into the game sporting a 2.72 ERA with 32 strikeouts in 28 innings. “It gives me so much comfort to know my team has my back, both on offense and defense. I know we can hit up and down the lineup and catch everything out there. Our hitting hasn’t been 100 percent, but it will get there.”
“Molly does a great job of not caring sometimes. It’s the weirdest thing. If someone crushes a home run, she just lets it go like nothing happened. It really works for her. I know she cares deep down, but she doesn’t let things like that bother her in the moment,” D’Amico added. “That’s how she gets out of tough innings. She’s not thinking about it being bases loaded with only one out. Freshman year she was a shortstop, so last year was her first year really getting on the mound. She’s made so much progress through those years. Each year when she comes back it’s like a whole new world of speed and control that she has. This year she has stepped up a ton.”
D’Amico never has to worry about Sweet stepping up. The Fairleigh Dickenson University catching recruit made two highlight-reel type of catches in center field and also drilled a home run leading off the bottom of the sixth that gave RV a 2-1 lead. Sweet robbed McNee on a deep fly to center as she crashed into the breakaway fence. She repeated that effort in the seventh on a high drive off the bat of Cherokee shortstop Izzy Peterson.
“I was very shaky on those plays,” Sweet admitted. “They were over my head. The last one was up there, everybody was talking and it took a long time for the ball to get out to me.”
“It’s not every day you come across a player like her. I’m going to miss her a lot next year. It’s probably a once-in-a-lifetime thing to have a player like her come through your program. I can put her anywhere on the field. She’s a catcher, but I can put her in center, I can put her at shortstop,” D’Amico said. “That’s three runs right there — she saved two, and scored one on a home run. That’s a three-run swing just from her alone. I don’t think she even knows how much she saves games. She’s the defining factor in our outfield, and nothing gets by her.”
Senior Allie Cunane took the loss inside the circle for Cherokee (5-3, 2-1 Olympic American) despite pitching a great game in place of all-state starter Cali Taylor, who was out due to injury. Cunane worked out of a bases-loaded jam in the third and left a runner stranded at third in the bottom of the fourth. And after Sweet’s home run she set down five of the next seven hitters.
“We were ready for Cali, but I was proud to see them step up against someone they didn’t really know,” D’Amico said. “They were mentally ready for Cali, but it was good to see someone new. They were ready to lock in because both of them are good pitchers. I just wanted them to be locked in and ready. We’ve been working on being more disciplined when we’re up to bat and not taking so many pitches.”
D’Amico and Sweet said the Red Devils, who have won three straight, are playing confident softball right now but they know there are some challenging games ahead, including matchups with the likes of Ocean City, Bordentown, Shawnee, Lenape and Cherokee again in the middle of May.
“We need to improve our attitudes on the bench (when we’re on offense). That’s really all that we need. We have everything else, we’re aces all around,” said Sweet, who came into the game hitting nearly .600 with 17 runs and 11 RBIs. “I think we can challenge to be state champions if we set our minds to it. I don’t think anybody can get in our way.”
“I want them to not take anyone lightly. There are a lot of teams that are doing some big things. We came into that Seneca game (a 3-2 loss last Thursday) and I don’t think we were expecting what we saw,” D’Amico said. “I want them to be confident now that they’ve beaten some good teams, but I want them to take that confidence into every game. There are some scrappy teams out there that are doing big things and moving up in the rankings, and I wan our girls to bear down, play solid defense and hit the ball the way they know how to. I want them to be consistent. Consistency is the biggest thing for us and I don’t want them to take any team lightly.”
WHAT’S NEXT: Rancocas Valley hosts Moorestown on Thursday at 3:45 p.m. Cherokee hosts Cherry Hill East on Monday at 3:45 p.m.
