LYNN — The St. Mary’s softball team played like the top seed in the Division 3 state tournament in its playoff debut Sunday afternoon, as the No. 1 Spartans pulled away late to blow out No. 32 Shawsheen by a score of 12-0 in six innings in a Round of 32 game at Breed Middle School.
Lily Newhall was once again a dominant force in the circle for the Spartans, taking a no-hitter through 4 2/3 innings before allowing a lone single. Newhall went all six innings and struck out 10 batters in the victory. She also went 1-for-3 with one RBI at the plate.
Roma Braid went 2-for-4 with two RBI to pace the offense for St. Mary’s, while Anna Fringuelli (1-for-2, two runs scored) and Jill Kirby (1-for-4, one run scored) each had two RBI as well. Jenna Chaplain went 2-for-5 with two doubles, one RBI and two runs scored from the leadoff spot, while Brooke Moloney (2-for-5) also had a multi-hit day. Riley Zukas and Ashanthy Pardilla each added a hit in the victory.
After Newhall worked through a 1-2-3 top of the first, the Spartans jumped ahead early thanks to a leadoff double from Chaplain and then an RBI single from Braid. After St. Mary’s pushed across another run via an error, the Spartans held a 2-0 lead.
And that lead remained until the bottom of the fifth, when the Spartans scored three more runs and started to pull away. An RBI single from Fringuelli got things started in the inning before St. Mary’s scored two more runs on account of Shawsheen errors.
Then, in the bottom of the sixth, St. Mary’s blew the game open.
Braid notched her second RBI single of the game to make it 6-0, then an RBI single from Newhall and a two-run single from Kirby pushed the lead to 9-0. Chaplain followed that with an RBI double of her own, then Moloney smashed a deep fly ball that turned into an error and brought home the final two runs to invoke the mercy rule.
St. Mary’s (17-4) has now punched its ticket into the Div. 3 Round of 16, where the top-ranked Spartans will face off against either No. 16 Norton or No. 17 Hanover Tuesday (TBD) back at Breed.
