Saturday, May 5, 2007  - Twin Lakes Invitational -Championship Game

WP - Kelsi Reed (10-0), CG, 2K, 0 walks (5 innings)
Tori Collins (Save) 0K, 0 walks
LP -  Alyssa Reed (9-2) CG, 4K, 2 walks

McCutcheon (20-2)
Kelsey Rummel (SS) Single, walk
Tori Collins (DH-P) 2 doubles, run scored, RBI
Kristen Garza (1B) Squeeze bunt, RBI

LOWELL (20-4)
Becca Nida (CF) Double
Kelly Johnson (SS) single

MONTICELLO (5-5-2007)  There's a tendency for NW Indiana high school sports people to say that other teams are not quite as good as 'we are up here'.  That isn't said of McCutcheon softball.  The Mavericks, who defeated Lake Central in the 2005 state finals, beat Hanover Central 4-0, Andrean 7-2 and Lowell 2-0 to send most of the Northwest Indiana representatives home and win the 17th Twin Lakes Softball Invitational Saturday in White County.

Pitching and defense rolled the day as McCutcheon hurlers Tori Collins (9-2) and Kelsi Reed (10-0) were backed by mistake-free defense to go 5-0 in the 16-team two day tourney that features a 'Motel 6' full of northern Indiana's top girls softball teams.

"Who's the best team we've faced?" smiled McCutcheon 22-year veteran varsity head coach Jim Bates.  "Well, Munster beat us (at April's Carmel Invitational).  I would say that Lowell is.  They've got good players up and down the lineup."

Reed and Collins, who retired the final six Devils in order, became the first pitchers to shut out Lowell this season.  Collins, a 5-11 left-hander, decided the game with an RBI double in the third-inning and a leadoff double in the sixth, helping her side score both runs.

Hard-throwing Lowell junior right-hander Alyssa Reed (8-2) held the Mavericks (20-2) to just six base hits, but Lowell really didn't come close to scoring after the first inning as a chilly Saturday evening fell on the tiny Twin Lakes Softball stadium just south of US 24 on Monticello's west side.

"We had fun," said Lowell coach Pete Iussig, whose team went 4-1 and lost in the title game at Twin Lakes for the second consecutive season.  "We stayed overnight this year.  They liked that.  There was a little team bonding thing there.  This team is just so into softball.  Nothing else is ever talked about in the dugout but softball.  I have enjoyed this group so much this year.  It was a good day today."

Lowell reached the championship game when they beat Lake County rival Munster 5-4 in eight innings.  The Mustangs (19-3) led 4-2 after a three-run fourth-inning double by Jessica Clusserath.  Lowell (20-4), which hosts Munster again Thursday, rallied with a run-scoring hit by Kristina Kuzma in the fifth, a two-out RBI single by Jacki Fletcher in the sixth and a one out RBI single from sophomore Megan Bolanowski in the bottom of the eighth.  Megan's sister Kaitlyn Bolanowski (9-2) shut out Munster the final four innings to get the complete game victory, a significant one for her since Iussig had pitched Reed in consecutive games last week.  Alyssa Reed shutout Boone Grove and Andrean and the coach had been riding her hot streak.

"We beat Frontier Friday night," Iussig said.  Frontier's a nice 1A team.  But she (Kaitlyn Bolanowski) gave up 11 hits.  "Alyssa pitched against Twin Lakes, a good 3A team.  But she gave up nine hits.  So we sat them down at lunch time today and said 'girls, you have to hit your spots better than that.'  Alyssa's got a little bit of giddy-up (she is a harder thrower), so she can get away with missing her spot.  But Kaitlyn can't."

"She really came through against Munster," added Iussig.  "She did her job.  And Alyssa rose to occasion too.  Six hits allowed against the No. 4 team in the state.  She was fine tonight."

Andrean coasted through pool play with three easy wins.  But the Niners had a defensive meltdown in the top of the second-innng against McCutcheon, allowing five runs on only one base hit.  Three infield errors allowed McCutcheon's Collins more than enough unearned runs to win the game.  The 59ers (19-4), the defending Twin Lakes champions, played well the vast majority of the time, but one bad inning in single elimination play sent them home before the title game.

"That's what we told them," said 59er coach Frank Podkul.  "You really can't make that many errors against a team like this.  When you play McCutcheon here, I knew the quality of team we were going up against."

With the bases loaded and one out in a scoreless game, Andrean either fumbled the ball or threw late to a base four times in five plays.  In a span of about three minutes, Andrean trailed 5-0 and freshman right-hander Alyssa Mosely was on her way to just her second defeat of the season, despite pitching well.

"We sure didn't help her much," said Podkul.  "I thought she did a pretty good job.  That's the pressure of youth, I guess.  One mistake turns into another.  Hopefully this will be a learning experience for us.  The next time we play here would be the (Class 3A) regional.  Playing this weekend should benefit us because we've got new people."

Hanover Central lost 2-1 to 2A No. 3 Eastern and 4-0 to McCutcheon before beating Western, a Kokomo-area school.  The Lady Cats' coach Larry McMillen felt they should have beaten Eastern, but the Hanover girls looked a little sleepy in a very quiet 4-0 loss to the eventual champion Mavericks.

"We need to toughen up a little," said McMillen after the second loss.  "I told them, if I see one more long face, we're going home.  We're not even going to play the third game.  We're going home.  You're supposed to come down here and get excited.  We make a mistake or something goes wrong and we cry about it."

Hanover freshman right-hander Jessica Toth, who was the losing pitcher against McCutcheon, pitched the final three innings to get the win against Western when senior Molly Fairhurst smacked an RBI ground out with one out in the sixth.

"We needed that game to save face down here," said McMillen, who is a little embarrassed that HC, with all its local success, has never escaped pool play in eight tries at the Twin Lakes Invitational.  "This was big.  We should have won the fist game.  We did not hit the ball well.  That pitcher (junior Kristen Dykes) wasn't any better than anything we'd already seen back home.  The only thing I wish Jessica and Kelsey (Jankowski) would do is get ahead early at the count."

Hanover is still looking to stir up some more offense against good pitching.  The Lady Cats (12-6) beat Rensselaer, South Central, LaCrosse and Boone Grove last week, but the strong Twin Lakes field slowed their bats and Hanover finished last week with five wins and two losses.

"We need a couple more bats," said McMillen, referring to young players already on the team who simply haven't hit yet.  "We played very well against South Central.  We hit their pitcher hard.  We hit well against Boone.  But we just didn't swing the bats down here."

Munster looked very strong in match-ups against three non-NW Indiana teams.  Even with inexperienced pitchers Grace Ispas and Elanor Kennedy, the Lady Ponies looked like state finals' contenders.  So did Lowell, which, along with Munster, was the best offensive team among the 16 in the field.  No region team can see McCutcheon until the state finals.

Andrean has some defensive problems, but their pitching and hitting is solid.  The 59ers and Hanover Central appear to be struggling with rookie players.  HC appears more than ready for the Porter County Conference (PCC) tournament in two weeks, but they are going to have to juice up the attack to take out Wheeler (14-2) at Sectional time.

"Both of their pitchers (McCutcheon) were really tough.  When you are rated fourth in the state, you're doing something right.  They have a great defense and very good pitching," said Lowell coach Pete Iussig.

"Who knows what's going to happen from this point on?  We didn't get the trophy here.  But we played well.  We have to play Munster again Thursday.  We're in the thick of things in the conference, but we might not win there.  Then we go to the sectional and, who knows, we could lose to Lake Central or Munster.  As great as things are going right now, we could still end up with nothing.  Well just have to wait and see."

TWIN LAKES NOTES:  Both of McCutcheon's pitchers, Tori Collins (8-2) and Kelsi Reed (10-0) are transfer students who were not at McCutcheon one year ago.  But it's not that simple.  Collins, who was 9-1 as a freshman at McCutcheon, transferred to Clinton Prairie where she was 14-2 and an honorable mention all-stater last season.  In a surprise, she transferred back this year.

"She's been great for us," Bates said.  "She's turning into quite a leader for us."

Reed was only 1-1 in 23 innings with Harrison in 2006.  There was no way of knowing that the 5-foot-9 sophomore right-hander would win her first 10 starts.

"We got lucky," Bates said.  "The first day of practice we had nine pitchers.  We had to tell three of them goodbye.  We couldn't use all of them."

Munster won the toughest pool at Twin Lakes, beating Benton Central (17-4), Lewis Cass (7-6) and Harrison (12-6) before losing to Lowell.

"That's okay," said Munster coach Beth Vesa.  "I wouldn't want to come all the way down here and not play good teams.  The Munster loss to Lowell was on the 'international tie-breaker', which puts a runner at second base to begin every inning.  In the eighth inning Munster had three consecutive flyballs, while Lowell immediately sacrificed the runner to third base and scored her on a base hit by Megan Bolanowski.

Lowell coach Pete Iussig credits the focus of his team on its background.

"We only have two seniors, but the two Johnson girls are very into softball, so maybe that has something to do with it," observed the Lowell coach.  "We've got some younger kids who play serious travel ball.  There's a core that plays in Orland Park (Ill.) and that's big time.  You're not doing that if you're not serious about the game."

Hanover coach Larry McMillen said he wants to talk to the Twin Lakes athletic office about getting a later starting time on Friday night.  The first tourney games are scheduled for 5:00 p.m. on the first day, which is always a Friday.  In the past, 5:00 p.m. Hanover time was 5:00 p.m. Monticello time.  But with the state-mandated change in Daylight Savings time, 5:00 p.m. in Monticello is 4:00 p.m. in Cedar Lake.  Hanover got that pushed back to 4:45 p.m., but they will always have a hard time getting from Cedar Lake to Monticello by 4:00 p.m.

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