TOWAMENCIN- Thursday afternoon, in their most important game this season so far, the North Penn Knights Softball team (15-4) came up big when it mattered. In this Suburban One matchup the Knights held the first place Central Bucks South Titans (14-3) scoreless for seven innings. The game was a defensive showcase up until the 6th inning when the North Penn bats finally came alive in the bottom of the 6th inning to win the game 3-0.

The top of the first inning looked fantastic for freshman pitcher Mady Volpe as she retired the side 1 2 3 with two strikeouts. The bottom of the first inning looked promising for the Knights as they had multiple base runners but ultimately couldn’t get the runners home.

Volpe had a shaky second inning walking three batters and loading the bases with two outs, but she shut down the Lady Titans’ hopes with her fourth strikeout of the game to end the inning. Unfortunately for the Knights, they could not find a groove as the first three batters went down on fly outs.

After three and a half uneventful innings the Knights came to bat looking to put the game away. You could feel the energy in the Knights dugout as senior Emily Groarke led off the inning. But it was sophomore Victoria Juckniewitz who lit the spark with a base hit to make her 2 for 2 on the day with two singles. Following Juckniewitz was sophomore Amanda Greaney who battled the count to walk and add an extra baserunner.

This led to the four hole hitter, junior Elia Namey, hitting a shot to the gap in right center field, scoring Juckniewitz and moving courtesy runner sophomore Gianna Costello to third base.

“What I’m thinking is just, why go into extra innings when we can just end it there? So if we get the hit, I got the hit, and then we just kept piling on from there. Jordan came up, got another run in, and that’s all we really needed to do,” explained Namey.

Feeling the momentum building, junior Jordan Pietrzykowski hit a blooper to right center field that caused a miscommunication between fielders that allowed Costello to score, senior runner Erin Cliver to be moved to third, and Pietrzykowski to reach second. The bench going wild, junior Jamie Beer came to bat. Beer laid down a perfect squeeze bunt to score Cliver and get to first for an infield single.

“It was perfect. Exactly where we wanted it to go,” said head coach Rick Torresani on Beer’s late squeeze bunt.

After a fielder’s choice and a fly out to end the inning the Knights went out into the field looking to put the Lady Titans away 3-0.

“So all day and all last night we have been so anxious for this game. We’ve been texting each other all day, hyping each other up and saying that we need to get this win. We want it so much especially since the last time playing them. This is all we have wanted, we’ve been waiting for this game and we came out, our heads were in it and we got it done,” exclaimed Namey.

Central Bucks South did not go down easy, with all three of the final batters making contact. The top of the seventh started with a line drive between third and shortstop, but Juckniewitz made a spectacular diving grab from third to make the first out. Next a pop fly to the outfield was put away for the second out of the inning. Back to the lead off hitter, North Penn was antsy to get the last out and finally put away the top ranked Titans. A ground ball to first base was picked up by Namey and she triumphantly stomped on first to end the ballgame.

“It’s a confidence builder. And now they know they are back in for the championship. That was one of our goals, you know, three out of four, that’s what I kept telling them, I want three out of four,” explained Torresani.

Volpe: 7 IP  0 R 4 BB 7 K

Juckniewitz: 2-2  2 Singles 1 Run

Namey: 1-3 Double  1 RBI

Beer: 1-3 Bunt Single  1 RBI