By DAVE O’SULLIVAN
Staff Writer
EGG HARBOR CITY — With two outs, two strikes and the winning run at third base in the bottom of the seventh inning of the sectional championship game, there isn’t anybody Cedar Creek softball coach Shawn Cohen would rather have at the plate than senior catcher MyKayla Bird.
Bird laced a hard ground ball up the middle that Manchester’s shortstop bobbled, and that miscue allowed Sage Errera to race home with the winning run as the Pirates shocked the Hawks, 2-1, in the South Jersey Group 2 title game on Tuesday afternoon. The win puts Cedar Creek, the No. 4 seed in South Jersey Group 2, up against Central Jersey champion Robbinsville — which beat top-seeded Bordentown 2-0 — on Thursday at Rowan University in the Group 2 semifinals. A victory would put the Pirates into the state championship game for the first time ever.
“It’s just crazy. We’re a comeback team, so I expected this from my girls. We’re just so happy we came out on top. Oh, my God, I don’t even know what happened. I’m not the fastest runner, so all I was thinking the whole time was, ‘alright, Sage, this is the time to be fast, right now is the time.’ I was moving my legs as fast as I could, then I touched home and everyone started cheering. I didn’t even know what happened,” Errera said. “It came down to who wanted it more, and we wanted it more.”
“I knew I just had to get it done. Everything was on my shoulders, everything we’ve been working all year for. The pressure was definitely on, and I felt like it was 10 times more. I knew I had to get it done,” said Bird, one of just two seniors on the team along with Errera. “When I hit it, I knew it wasn’t a for-sure play, so I knew I had to bust it through the bag at first and just hope (Sage) was busting her butt down the line to home. I didn’t even see her score until I turned around and saw all those people going crazy, and I was like, ‘we got it done.'”
Manchester’s Alyssa Hampton had twirled a gem up until that seventh inning, shutting down Cedar Creek’s offense, including wiggling out of a bases-loaded jam in the bottom of the fifth. Eleventh-seeded Manchester (9-13) — which knocked off No. 1 Delran in the semifinals — was able to scratch a run across in the top of the fifth when Emily Lynch drove home Hailey Dries with a sharp single up the middle, and had a chance to tack on more in the seventh when the Hawks put a runner on with two outs, but Pirates sophomore pitcher Ally Schlee induced a groundout to end the threat.
That set up the dramatic seventh inning.
The bottom of the order, which Hampton had shut down most of the game, came through for Cedar Creek (16-10), as Jenna Price led off with a single down the right-field line. Lauren Palomo followed with a bunt single, and leadoff hitter Venizya Sanchez sacrificed both runners into scoring position. After a fielder’s choice by Errera cut down the lead runner at third, Brianna Young singled home Palomo, knotting the score 1-1. Both Errera and Young moved up a base on the throw home, setting the stage for Bird with two outs and runners at second and third. Bird worked the count to 3-1, then fouled a pitch off before hitting a hard grounder up the middle.
“MyKayla, ever since she was a freshman, I’ve just been telling her to work the pitcher and drive the ball. She hits the ball hard,” said Cedar Creek coach Shawn Cohen. “Today, she got on base a couple of times and did what she needed to do to help us win. I have two seniors this year, and they are both coming through when we need them. I couldn’t ask for anything more from either one of them.”
Sanchez said she was worried after the Pirates had squandered that bases-loaded opportunity in the fifth.
“At first, I lost a little bit of confidence, but then I was like, ‘you know what? We got this.’ And I started cheering because it was rally cap time. It was difficult, but Sage is a really great captain, and so is Kay, when it comes to keeping the team together,” Sanchez said. “I had faith in (Bird). There was a little bit of doubt just because there was so much tension. This is a really good experience. I was on the verge of crying, it’s so much to take in.”
“We’ve played in all kinds of games this season, and the way this team has played, I’m not afraid of 1-0 or 2-0. We’ve played in games that were 10 innings and 0-0,” Cohen said. “Every win and every loss has led us to this moment. They’ve learned how to fight back and score when we need to. The other team made a mistake, and we just happened to have people on base and were able to capitalize on it. I’ll take a win any way I can get it.”
Schlee did a tremendous job for the Pirates, scattering six hits while striking out three in seven innings, and she got a lot of defensive help. Of the 21 outs Cedar Creek recorded, 14 were made on ground balls in the infield.
“She’s solid. She hits her spots and does what she has to do. She’s been great for us,” Sanchez said. “There were some doubts, but we knew we were going to come back because we are a last-few-innings type of team. We always come back in the end, so I had faith.”
“The pressure was definitely there, and when they tacked on that first run we knew we only had two innings to get the job done,” Bird added. “I’m absolutely ecstatic for (Ally). Physically and mentally she was in the game, and she’s only a sophomore getting the job done. I said, ‘me and you, Ally, we’ll get it done. Just like having a catch, that’s how you’ll get through this game.’ I just tried to get her to relax.”
Cohen said he was nervous with two outs in the seventh inning, but just had to trust that his team could find away to scratch a run across to win the game.
“It was out of my hands at that point. I just had to hope we didn’t make a big blunder, like getting somebody picked off or leave early. I told Bryanna at second base not to do anything, she wasn’t the winning run, so I just told her to stand there and enjoy this whole thing. Let Sage do all the work. Even Sage, when she got to third base, she said, ‘what do I do if there is a passed ball?’ I told her to go. That we would take it any way we could get it. It was awesome to watch them come through,” Cohen said. “I don’t know when this run is going to end. I hope it doesn’t end anytime soon.”
Contact Dave O’Sullivan: sully@acglorydays.com; on Twitter @GDsullysays