WPCNR PRESS BOX. By Fastpitch Johnny. August 11, 2004: The Texas Thunder caught up with Amazing Amanda Scott Tuesday night. They ripped the New York New Jersey Juggernaut’s Blonde Dominator for four smash hits in the 4th to overcome a 1-0 Nauts lead. Christa Williams, the Olympic Champion was in control the entire way at Montclair State University Stadium, allowing only two hits, fanning 7 to maintain the Thunder's 2 Game lead over Akron for first place and push the Juggernaut 3 games behind Akron with 7 to play.
CHRISTA CONTROL: Christa Williams, the Olympic Champion was in complete command Tuesday evening as the Juggernaut closed out their inaugural season in New York. Selena Collins delivered the knockout punch with a soaring 2-run double to right center to put Texas ahead 3-1. Lyndsey Klein drove in the only Juggernaut run and narrowly missed a 2-run homer in the sixth that Erin Evans caught back to the fence. Photo by WPCNR Sports
Amanda Scott had retired 22 of 23 Texas hitters in a row starting from the 4th inning of Sunday evening’s game to the 4th inning of Tuesday’s game, just handcuffing the big bats of the hardest hitting team in the league.
Laura Harms, starting at 3rd in an effort to handle Liz Bouck’s bunts, lead off the Naut third with a bunt single to first base, giving the Thunder a taste of Bouck. In fact Bouck did not hurt the Nauts tonight, as Harms threw the Texas Jackrabbit out once, except for one sweet run and bunt play in the 5th inning that Bouck executed in the 4th.
Harms in Way: Williams fanned Courtney Scott and caught Carri Leto looking, but on the first pitch to Leto, Harms swiped second sliding past the bag but getting a hand back in. Thunder Manager Wayne Daigle argued in vain. Photo by WPCNR Sports
Nauts Grab Early Lead: The 358 fans who showed up for the last home game were feeling pretty good after a Lyndsey Gardner error set up a Naut lead in the bottom of the third. Here Lyndsay Gardner at second base is playing hot potato with Lauren Bauer's grounder while Laura Harms races to third. It prolonged the 3rd inning, allowing Lyndsey Klein of the Nauts to come up and single home the run for a 1-0 Naut lead. Photo by WPCNR Sports
With 2 out Lauren Bauer hit a routine grounder to Gardner at second who appeared to take her eye off the ball and she boxed it with Harms wheeling to third.
Lyndsey Klein then singled cleanly past shortstop Buchholz for a 1-0 lead, Joy in Juggernautville.
Naut Fans Shake their Heads.
With Amazing Amanda in the circle and mowing them down, fans felt the Nauts were in good shape. Then, in one of the mysteries of the game, Amanda Scott stopped being amazing and turned into Jose Contreras all too quickly.
Hardly had the fans had time to enjoy the sweet Klein RBI, when Lyndsay Gardner singled sharply to right on the first pitch. O.K., no harm done. On a 3-2 pitch, 3rd place hitter Kristin Zaleski laced a looper to right on pitch appearing to be up. Two on. Well, that pitch didn’t look too good.
Again, Amanda worked the redoubtable Ryan Realmuto, the heroine of Monday night. Realmuto ran to another 3-2 count. This was eerie….so similar to Sunday evening’s Amanda attack in the 3rd inning of Sunday’s game.
On a 3-2, Amanda again appeared to locate up, over the plate with not much on it and Realmuto singled high over the outstretched glove of a leaping Lyndsey Klein at shortstop, to tie the game 1-1. What was wrong with Amanda? This is not good.
With Zaleski on second and Realmuto on first, Scott threw 2 balls to Ginger Jones-Powers and Ginger smacked one to Carri Leto moving quickly to her right and throwing Powers out at first moving runners to 2nd and 3rd. Well, maybe we can get out of this.
Selena Slugs It.
The Great Scott smiling at the 10 balls she had been called for so far in the inning by plate umpire Angel Martinez, went to work. The count moved to 3-2 and BOOM! Disaster.
Catcher Selena Collins took another pitch that appeared up, slow and fat and tagged it high and deep to the rightcenter. It was sailing into the gap against the backdrop of the night.
Wilkerson playing her in straightaway right was not going to get it. Bauer, shading Collins to left center appeared to have the better shot but the ball out distanced Lauren, getting down and rolling, rolling to the 210 mark at the base of the fence. Zaleski scored. Realmuto scored. 3-1, Thunder. Not a good thing.
SELENA COLLINS, SCOTT SOLVER: WPCNR asked Selena to take us through the key at bat. “It was either 3-2 or 2-2, I’m not sure. I was looking out (side). I knew I had to make that adjustment inside, that’s what she was throwing pretty much all night. I was just looking for a good outside pitch. I got one and I just went with it. I think it was a curve ball.” Photo by WPCNR Sports
Collins said you have to have a plan on each at bat: “You don’t necessarily want to guess. You want to have a game plan when you go up to bat. Mine was definitely to just hit the ball hard.”
I asked how the Thunder got to a pitcher that had retired 22 of 23 Thunder hitters over 7 innings, Collins credited the Thunder heart: “Just the momentum, the fact that they scored we wanted to get a run back, help out our pitcher. We got some basehits. People got on. Did their job. And that was our goal. To get on base and hit the ball hard.”
Asked if the team could run the table the rest of the way, Collins said. “It would be nice to. We have a good pitching staff. We have a good all-around defense. It’s a matter of how well we swing our bats. As of right now, we’re swinging the bats real well, and hopefully that’ll get us through the playoffs.”
That’s something the Juggernaut is not doing. After the 3 runs scored in the sixth (by way of an error prolonging the 6th inning), the Nauts have scored 1 run in 17 innings, as the Thunder took three of 4 after losing the first game of the series.
Williams on Christa Control
The main reason for that was Christa Williams the nemesis of the USA Softball team in the NPF All-Star Game. Williams kept the Nauts off-balance and looking inept at the plate the entire game. Only Lyndsey Klein and Kellie Wilkerson hit the ball hard.
Williams was touched up in relief Sunday night for a loss, but things were different Tuesday night, she said:
CHRISTA WILLIAMS on the turnaround: “I felt like I did a better job warming up tonight, and I found out some things that were keys to my mechanics that obviously made a big difference tonight. I felt really good. I felt good in warm-ups. My catcher (Selena Collins) and I clicked really well. We pretty much hit our spots and did the best we could. Stuff happens and you have to be able to bounce back. You know we’ve had some rough spells defensively at times. But, we have a good team. We have a good offense. You got to keep them in there and hopefully, sooner or later they’ll pull a run out for you, and they played a very nice inning (the 4th).” Photo by WPCNR Sports
We asked the champ about the playoffs: “I feel confident. Once you get in the playoffs though, it’s anybody’s game. It doesn’t really matter how good you are, or what you’ve done in the season. It’s important that we realize as a team that we gotta go out there and bust our butts from the very first pitch.”
Erin Reels in Klein
Klein blasted one in the sixth after a Williams error allowed Lauren Bauer to reach base. On the first pitch Klein hit a towering drive to straight away left up into the west wind. Back back back drifted Erin Evans the fleet leftfielder. She was on the running track, still backing up. Her back against the yellow Reno Appliance sign. A collective moan lifted to the night as Evans calmly reached up with both hands and hauled the drive in as it came down. Klein had just missed a 2-run homer.
ERIN EVANS MADE THE CATCH OF THE NIGHT. Photo by WPCNR Sports
Erin Evans, the best defensive leftfielder in the league, said she thought it was gone when it left the bat: “When it first came off the bat, yeah, but you have to play everything like it’s not going to go out. So I took off for it. It’s really high. I really didn’t know I was that close to the fence. But I tried to keep my eyes focused on the ball and come up with the catch and I did.”
Did the wind blow it back? “You know I really couldn’t tell ya, I was just watching it, and it came down to me. You just focus on the ball. Sometimes the wind does play a big part, I really didn’t see it being a big factor in this game. It was really high so she probably didn’t get all of it. If it was more of a line drive it would have gone out. I’m sure she got under it a little bit to hit that high. Lucky for us it stayed in the park.”
Getting the Jump.
Evans says she “works on getting great jumps,” in her outfield play. That was evident when she robbed Kellie Wilkerson on a straight-to-the-left-field line running waist high catch leaning to the line off Kellie in the 4th inning.
“That’s something that helps me out a lot is I can get a great jump and I can see it off the bat pretty well, and I be aggressive, you know, and knowing when you can go for it and when you can’t. It’s knowing the game.”
Asked how much she practiced, she said they play so many games that her practice is pretty much the warm-ups for the game: “It’s really whatever they hit us. At this level, they feel we should be able to catch them by now.”
The biggest mistakes outfielders make:
“I think the biggest thing in not being able to do is not getting a read on the ball. If you don’t have a good read on the ball it means the difference between a base hit or a triple, if you don’t get a good read on it and it goes over your head. The biggest mistake that I think other outfielders have, is a lot of times, especially when we have infielders go to the outfield and they haven’t seen the line drives. Line drives I think are the toughest ones. They come right at you, and it lifts or it curves. Infielders aren’t used to seeing that.
They get out there, thinking that a fly ball is no big deal, but the line drives, I think that’s the biggest thing is getting the jumps and reading the ball, and the biggest mistake is not knowing how to read it.”
The Thunder finish the season with New England and Sacramento and barring an intensity let down, they should hold off Akron which trails them by two games.
Ironically, Christa Williams retired the last 13 Nauts she faced tonight after coughing up the one run. It was an eerie duplication of what Amanda Scott did to the Thunder Sunday night, after the Thunder scored their 3 runs. Ball is so symetrical.
Plemenos' Take:
Naut Manager Paul Plemenos, the Connie Mack of the NPF, said "We couldn't catch a break. I thought the strike zone moved all over the place. So when the strike zone moved, she (Amanda) was getting squeezed. She got totally squeezed (in the 4th). It's hard to be a pitcher when you have to throw it down the pipe, and when you have to throw it down the pipe to really good hitters. That's hard."
Asked if Amand was tired, Plemenos said "No. Amanda's strong, and she got herself out of tough spots. Hey, look, if Klein's ball goes out it's a 4-3 game, and we're right back in it. Evans is a great left fielder. She made two great plays. Kellie Wilkerson hit a hard one to left and Evans made a nice play on that, and the shortstop ( Buchholz) made a great play on her before. So we just couldn't string things together. "
We'll get em. We have a six game road trip. We come back. Three days of hard pratice, and then we fly out to Akron."
Scott took the loss, her record is now 13-7 to lead the league. Williams is right behind with the win at 12-6. The Thunder wanted this game and showed speed, power, daring, and their best baserunning of the series.
The Thunder added a 4th run in the 5th inning on a run and bunt executed by Erin Evans and Liz Bouck, The Texas Jackrabbit. With Evans running Bouck bunted to Harms who threw her out, but Gina Oaks throw to third did not get Evans at third. With a runner on third, Lyndsay Gardner executed a suicide squeeze perfectly right to the pitcher forcing Amanda to handle the bunt, who elected to get the sure out at first since the fleet Evans was almost in to the plate when Amanda picked up the ball, to make it 4-1. Karrie Rider's double down the line in the 7th to right field and a single by Zaleski scored the 5th run.
The Juggernaut head for Sacramento tomorrow for a three-game set Thursday Friday and Saturday.
THUNDER TAKE CONTROL: The last handshakes of the season at the Juggernaut home park last night. Photo by WPCNR Sports
NATIONAL PRO FASTPITCH STANDINGS August 11, 2004
Tuesday Results
Texas 5, NY-NJ Juggernaut 1
New England 2, Arizona 1
Akron at Sacremento (Late Night)
