HTC SOFTBALL

Hellman's walk-off sends Crusaders to regional semis

HTC beats Winfield Mt. Union 10-9 as Crusaders wipe out four-run deficit

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WEST POINT – There’s so many things to say about the Holy Trinity Catholic girls’ softball comeback win Wednesday night over Winfield-Mt. Union.
HTC head coach Loren Menke said he had thousands of thoughts about the game that went nine innings before the Lady Crusaders walked off with a 10-9 win over Winfield-Mt. Union in Class 1A District 12 quarterfinals at South Park in West Point.
“I think I had about 5,000 thoughts during the game,” Menke said.
“If we’d have done this this way, or if this call had gone that way, or if that call had been a strike. There’s so many different ways this game could have gone.”
What did go the Crusaders way was Ellie Hellman’s RBI double to center in the bottom of the ninth that drove in Morgan Krogmeier with the game-winning run.
Menke threw his hat up in the air and the celebration was on, but the very young Lady Crusader softball team hadn’t let it sink in that the game was over and kept running the bases after Krogmeier scored.
“I turned around and it was crazy and they were still playing and I was thinking I was the dumbest coach ever at that point. I thought I had the score wrong,”
But he didn’t. The Crusaders just didn’t realize they had won.
HTC trailed 5-1 through the top of the third after Sydney Jarvis scored on a wild pitch in the second. The Wolves put up five in the top of the third in an inning that got away from the Crusaders a bit. Jarvis gave up a walk and a double that went off right fielder Kat DiPrima’s glove to put two on. A sacrifice bunt scored one run and another double by Makiah Lower drove in two more for a 3-1 W-MU lead. Kellee Milks added another run with an RBI bunt back to Jarvis. An errant throw allowed Milks to go all the way to third, still with no outs.  Milks would end up stealing home for the fifth run of the inning before Jarvis would work her way out of the jam.
Both teams would go scoreless through the end of the fifth.
With Lower throwing from W-MU in the sixth, Krogmeier worked a walk and stole second to open the bottom half of the fifth. A ground out fielder’s choice moved Krogmeier to third and she would come around on DiPrima’s  triple through short. DiPrima would score on Hellman’s single to left to make it 5-3 before the rally ended with a strikeout and a ground out.
Jarvis would get the Wolves 1-2-3 in the top of the sixth and the Crusaders went to work for four runs in the bottom half of the frame with Todd and Hellman both collecting RBI singles for a 7-5 HTC lead.
Winfield would respond with two in the top of the seventh highlighted by Lower’s triple and Lilly Heckethorn’s double to tie things up at 7.
HTC loaded the bases in the bottom of the seventh with two outs when Winfield decided to intentionally walk Jarvis and Krogmeier. Todd would then hit a sharp line drive to right that was caught to force extra innings.
Neither team would score in the eighth inning despite having runners on. Winfield would strike first in the ninth when Miller stroked an RBI double to center with no outs. Jarvis would get a strikeout for the first out but Heckethorn would drive in another run with her one-out fielder’s choice.  An infield ground out would get the Crusaders out of trouble.
Then a walk to Kara Lake set the tone for the bottom of the ninth. Ross would follow with a double off the fence in right to put both runners in scoring position. Jarvis hit a rocket to center that was caught, but allowed Lake to score on the tag. Krogmeier would work a full count walk and Todd would single on a grounder to short that moved Ross and Krogmeier up.
Then DiPrima hit an RBI single to second scoring Ross to tie things back up at 9 before Hellman rattled a 1-1 pitch into center for the game winner, setting off a celebration that HTC hasn’t seen in decades.
Menke threw his hat into the air and temporarily lost it before someone retrieved it off the top of the Crusader dugout.
Hellman, just a freshman, said the win was “awesome”.
“You gotta just keep pushing and we did that,” she said. “We kept on rallying even when they got two runs in the ninth. We came back and that awesome.”
Hellman said the end of the season had crossed her mind when the Lady Crusaders trailed by 5.
“The thought crossed my mind for a little bit but then we just kept talking to each other and saying we could do this,” she said.
“It feels amazing. We put in a ton of work this season and to get it, for not only our coaches, but for ourselves by pushing is awesome.
Menke said the girls have exceeded all his expectations no matter what happens going forward.
“They just believe in themselves. They think they can beat anybody. They’ve exceeded my expectations and they are just a fun group to be around,” he said.
“They believe they can do it. We’re not a hard-hitting team we just have to keep putting the ball in play and see what happens.”
This is the first time the Crusaders have won two games to start the post-season since the Crusader’s restart of the softball program six years ago.
Hellman went 4-for-5 with three RBIs to lead the Lady Crusaders on offense. She also kept things under control behind the plate for HTC. Ross was 3-of-5 as was DiPrima, who also had three RBIs. Jarvis and Todd both had multi-hit games.
Jarvis went the distance, throwing 149 pitches. She gave up nine runs through the nine innings and struck out a season-high 12 hitters while walking four.
"I’m proud of the girls and I’m happy we got the win. It’s something for us to build on," Menke said.
The Crusaders (8-11) now travel to Busey to take on Twin Cedars (14-11) on Friday in the Region 6 semifinals.

Holy Trinity Catholic, HTC, Crusaders, Winfield-Mt.Union, softball, Region 6, Class 1A, softball, sports, varsity, Ellie Hellman, Loren Menke, Pen City Current,

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