Pitching Depth Favors Tolland Softball

Fermi players knew it would be a challenge to play Tolland Wednesday morning without its two best pitchers, who were away on trips to Europe during school vacation.

The Falcons received gutsy performances from their third and fourth pitchers, but they lacked the experience on the mound to contain the visiting Eagles.

Tolland beat Fermi 17-0 on an early agreement of the 15-run mercy rule after four innings of the CCC East game in which both coaches consented.

The Eagles (3-3) scored nine runs in the first inning off sophomore Olivia Baillargeon on three hits, five walks, an error and a hit batter. Kelsey Lewis, who led off the game with an infield single, smacked a ball over the Fermi right fielder’s head in her second at bat of the inning for a grand slam, which made it 8-0.

Tolland, which has won two of its last three games, scored three runs in the second inning and after a scoreless third – Baillargeon’s best inning with two strikeouts, one hit and one walk. The Eagles added five more in the fourth, which forced Falcons coach Sean Sweeney to bring in reliever Danielle Lavender, a sophomore, who began the game at second base.

“I greatly appreciated how Olivia pitched,” Sweeney said. “She’s not a pitcher and she gave it a shot, and she wasn’t feeling her best.” Baillargeon received medical attention for an ankle injury during the game.

“We had to play on our toes when we had trouble throwing strikes today. We got flat-footed. It was an all around rough day. We kind of fell into that ‘blah,’” Sweeney said. “But I liked the attitude of our younger players today. Danielle came in and was willing to try pitching and [sophomore left fielder] Emily Quail was into it the whole game mentally.”

Fermi (1-4) managed one hit off Tolland starter Alex D’Aloisio, who improved to 2-2 after missing the first few games of the spring while recovering from injury. D’Aloisio struck out five and walked one.

“We kind’ve been easing her back into it,” Eagles coach Tom Drury said. “I think this was her first solid effort. She was pretty much on. Alex is our number one pitcher when healthy.”

D’Aloisio could not have been much better. Melissa Urbon smacked a clean single into center field with two outs in the bottom of the first for the Falcons’ lone hit. They did not have a base runner after pinch-hitter Michelle Rivera’s leadoff walk in the bottom of the second inning.

“We made decent contact off a fast pitcher but we didn’t make any adjustments,” said Sweeney, whose team has lost three in a row. “She was pretty good.”

Tolland’s hitters collected nine hits, drew 15 walks and forced Fermi into making three errors. Drury, who said Fermi suffered through a brutal day, appreciated the Eagles winning by a lopsided margin for the second time this season. “It was nice to see,” Drury said.

“We’ve been up and down this season. But we’re getting healthy and that’s making a difference. We’ve had four starters hurt this year. We were solid in the field. We played clean defense.”

Even with the game shortened by three innings, Drury had the opportunity to insert four reserves into the game – Meg Forbush, Kelsey Kaplan, Alayna Zevallos and Chiara Elwood, who batted twice in the fourth inning and picked up an RBI on a bases-loaded walk.

Sweeney approached Drury about cutting the game short and Drury was accommodating.