MARBLEHEAD — Last season was an emotional one for the Marblehead softball team. The Magicians began the season mourning the loss of Assistant Coach Todd Norman before using that emotion as motivation. From there, it was on to the Final Four with a record of 21-5.
Now, the Magicians move forward with hopes of making the state title game.
“Getting to the Final Four and losing in extra innings – their mindset is that we want to get back,” said Head Coach Johnny Gold. “They worked hard in the offseason. This past week was great. We had two days of tryouts and we’re bringing two sophomores coming up. In terms of head count, we’ll be a bit shorter than last year since we have only two seniors compared to eight last year, but it’s OK.”
The Magicians are returning their battery in star pitcher Tessa Francis, as well as Division 1 commit Luka Bornhorst, who will set up behind the plate.
“Tessa Francis is now a junior. I believe she led the state – at least, our division – in strikeouts. She had 272 strikeouts last year,” Gold said. “We also have her catcher back, Luka Bornhorst, who is going to play Division 1 softball at Stonehill. So, we have our pitching-and-catching tandem in place. They play all season long and they’re ready to go.”
Opposing teams may see that Marblehead graduated eight seniors. However, the Magicians were still a young team last year and will return seven of nine starters.
Despite bringing back the same core of players, Gold knows they’ll need to prove they belong.
“We’re returning seven out of the nine starters, which is helpful, but not to sound cliché or anything, we need to forget about last year and go out and prove it again,” he said. “We moved to the other side of the conference now, so where we’d only play Beverly, Danvers, and Peabody once – we now play them twice. So, the schedule is much more difficult, plus the other seven games we picked up are also difficult. We’ll play Bishop Fenwick, Malden Catholic, and Boston Latin. We’ve got ourselves a big schedule.”
The starting pitching-and-catching duo is lined up with Francis and Bornhorst. The infield will be made up of Tessa Andriano (third base), Hailey Schmitt (shortstop), and Lyla McGovern (first base) with Kate Andriano also seeing time at first base.
Second base, according to Gold, is still open and there will be a competition.
“We brought Keliane Salem up for the tournament last year and she’s going to be a contributor at second,” he said. “Caroline Black is also a sophomore and will battle it out at second base, too.”
The outfield consists of three juniors: Isabel Mortensen in right field, Ashley Mortensen in center field, and Nora Mahan in left field.
In addition to the starters, Gold is looking forward to seeing how Lucy Rogers develops.
“Lucy Rogers will see time as a designated hitter/designated player. She’s a really good hitter,” Gold said.
When asked what he’s looking forward to the most, Gold touched upon the “honor to coach” his student-athletes.
“I’m excited to go right back and do what we did last year and give it our best shot and, hopefully, we can get to the next step,” he said. “They’re really fun kids to coach and they work really hard.”
