Napoleon pitcher Arianna Kiessling struck out nine, walked none, and spread out seven hits to lead the visiting Wildcats to a 2-1 Northern Lakes League softball victory over Bowling Green Wednesday.
Despite the loss, the evening was about BG’s six seniors, Sammie Trimpey, Makenna Oates, M.J. Walters, Brynn Wilhelm, Kaylee Bullis and Candice Hernandez, on Senior Night. Trimpey plans to play college softball at NCAA Division III Heidelberg University.
“Our senior class has done great things for us and they are all great leaders,” BG coach Cassie Nauman said. “We have a great senior class starting with Sammie Trimpey.
“She’s been our lead-off and she’s been solid at shortstop for us for a long time now. She broke a school record with batting average last year and she’s really close to the stolen base record at the school. She gets on first base and she’s easily on second and scores a lot of runs for us.”
The other three seniors who regularly start are Oates, Walters, and Wilhelm.
“Makenna Oates has played a bunch of different positions — third base last year, second base this year,” Nauman said. “She is somebody who is trustworthy for us on defense and has come up with some big hits for us.
“M.J. Walters hadn’t played in a few years. She came out and she is hitting a lot of RBIs. She is holding down at first base and doing great things.
“She had an injury and said, ‘Hey, I want to do this my senior year.’ She came to me in December and she has worked hard ever since. She didn’t miss a thing in the offseason, put in the work, and she’s holding her own out there.
“Senior Brynn Wilhelm out in left field — we move her between nine (batting lineup) and two (spot), and that is because she can either help our lead-off by getting on before her, or she can bring in RBIs when our lead-off gets on.
“We also have two seniors with us who played some JV and they held their own out there. They didn’t have any balls hit to them or anything so they didn’t get any big chances, but they had some good at-bats.”
All six seniors started in the loss to Napoleon Wednesday. The Bobcats outhit the Wildcats, but Napoleon made better use of their baserunners.
Even when BG’s No. 9 hitter, Hannah Yarger, hit an inside-the-park home run to tie the game at one run apiece in the third inning, Napoleon’s pitcher, Kiessling, never buckled.
“You’ve just got to stay level-headed in the circle when that stuff happens — just stay relaxed and keep going,” Kiessling said.
Napoleon coach Chad Gregory says that is Kiessling’s trademark.
“She doesn’t (panic),” Gregory said. “She keeps her calm throughout the game no matter what hitters are up there, whether it’s two, three, four, or seven, eight, nine. She just stays within herself, does what she can do and she has a lot of defense behind her.”
Yarger hit a line drive into center field, which Napoleon outfielder Baylee Lamming reached for but couldn’t get her glove on it. The ball got past Lamming, rolled to the fence, and the speedy Yarger had her round-tripper.
Other than Lamming misjudging Yarger’s hit, Napoleon made no errors in the field, including one line drive that Lamming snagged, and a few line drives and tough pop-ups that stuck in infielders’ mitts.
That included the final out in the bottom of the seventh inning — a hard hit line drive hit by Wilhelm that Napoleon third baseman Faith Rubinstein snared with two outs and runners on first and second base.
Rubinstein had to make sure the ball stuck in her glove, because if Wilhelm’s shot gets past her or she drops it, you are looking at a tie game and extra innings, at the least.
“Definitely, it’s great to have them behind me,” Kiessling said. “I trust them a lot.”
Offensively, the Wildcats struck first in the top of the second. After BG junior pitcher Zoe Ziems struck out the side in the first, Rubinstein led off the second with a base hit to left field and ultimately scored on an RBI double by Anika McCorkle.
Jessica Patterson scored the ultimate game-winner in the fifth, getting a two-out base hit and then reaching second when the BG right fielder bobbled the ball. Patterson scored on an RBI base hit to center field by Emma Grisier.
The Wildcats had just five hits off Ziems, who struck out 14 and walked one, including striking out the side on four occasions.
While the Wildcats were stringing together timely hits, the Bobcats were not. The Bobcats stranded seven runners, the Wildcats left four on base.
“We just weren’t hitting timely,” Nauman said. :We only had one baserunner here or there in an inning. We couldn’t get more than one baserunner on. We just weren’t getting hits at the right times.
“The bloopers killed us today. I think they had one hit over our head, one other shot other than that was in front of us, but those bloopers were dropping in and killing us.”
Napoleon’s only hit that did not contribute to a run was a single to left field hit by Alexa Duryea, who was stranded. In the sixth, Duryea was also the recipient of Ziems’ only free pass to first base, but she was stranded then, too.
Napoleon improves to 7-8 overall and 4-5 in the NLL, while BG drops to 8-8 and 3-4. The two teams still have to meet in Napoleon for a make-up game that has not been scheduled yet.
“We’re right in the middle (of the NLL standings) and we’re just taking it one game at a time right now,” Gregory said. “We’re not looking too far ahead.”
For BG, Trimpey was 3-for-4 with a stolen base, freshman Kylie Kubacki had a double and base hit in two at-bats, and Wilhelm and Hannah Saylor had base hits.
