EVERETT— The St. Mary’s softball team picked the perfect time to have its best offensive game. No. 10 St. Mary’s popped four home runs Monday night, en route to a 12-2 win over No. 2 Pope John in the Division 3 North quarterfinal at McGrann Playground.
“It’s exceptional. We’ve never had such a great hitting day through the order,” St. Mary’s coach Paige Licata said. “I’ve been saying that would be the key to a big win. Not just the same players hitting but everyone up and down the order.”
The Spartans were powered by a three-run home run from Talia Smaller, a two-run home run from Jordan Sullivan, and solo blasts by Jennie Iudice and Taylor Sullivan. The four round-trippers accounted for seven of St. Mary’s 12 runs.
“Taylor bats No. 9 in our order and she hit one out,” Licata said. “Throughout the 1-9, everyone hit today. Because of that, we had such a great game today. It wasn’t us waiting for the same batters to come up again. It was everyone chipping in.”
With the win, the Spartans advance to Thursday afternoon’s (4) Division 3 North semifinal where they’ll battle the winner between No. 14 Lynnfield and No. 11 Amesbury.
“They’re both good teams,” Licata said. “We don’t take anyone lightly. Anything can happen in any game. It’s hard to match up what’s happened in previous games because that doesn’t matter. I try not to give them any info and we just prepare on a lot of hitting against good pitching. (Former Spartans pitcher) Mia Nowicki has been pitching to us in practice and it’s paid off.”
Spartans starting pitcher Lily Newhall put together another impressive outing, throwing four innings. Newhall allowed no earned runs on four hits and fanned seven. She was relieved by Christina Nowicki, who pitched the final three innings.
“Lily, as an eighth-grader in a tournament setting, has handled it very well,” Licata said. “Going against a great team, you never know how a younger player might react but it really worked out. Christina came out and really put in some work. Bringing Christina in has really helped us so far.”
The Spartans jumped out to a swift lead in the top of the first. Nowicki drew a walk to start the game and scored the first run of the evening on an error. Smaller followed with a RBI groundout, scoring Felicia D’Alessandro to stretch St. Mary’s lead to 2-0.
That’s how it stayed until Pope John found the scoreboard in the bottom of the third. A pair of Spartans errors allowed the Tigers to plate two runs, tying the game at 2-2.
St. Mary’s answered quickly with a two-run home run from Jordan Sullivan in the top of the fourth, reclaiming the lead at 4-2. Smaller cleared the centerfield fence with a three-run home run in the top of the fifth, boosting the Spartans lead to 7-2.
Iudice joined the home run club in the top of the sixth with a solo blast.
St. Mary’s added two more in sixth and two in the seventh, including a solo round-tripper by Taylor Sullivan, sealing the scoring for the 10-2 win.
“If we can hit continuously, we’re going to be a powerhouse,” Licata said. “I’ve seen it in practice but I haven’t seen it translate in games. I told them that if we could ever do it, it’d be huge. Hopefully we’ve built some confidence and I’m hoping this continues going into the next game.”
