CROWN POINT: No team will ever have more experienced pitching quality than Crown Point does. Senior Miranda Elish (15-1, 0.67, 194 strikeouts/19 walks) and junior right hander Alexis Holloway (14-2, 0.47, 190 strikeouts/20 walks) combined to pitch 207 innings last season allowing 17 earned runs and striking out 384. The two all-staters allowed only 74 base hits and 39 walks all season. CP hit .324 as a team, scored 224 runs (7 per game) in 2015 and made just 24 errors in the field. They are the defending champions of the Duneland Athletic Conference (DAC), Class 4A Sectional 2, the CP Invitational and the multi-state Lakeshore Michigan Invitational.

Elish (46 of 96, .479), Holloway (35 of 99, .354), MacKenzie Dunlap (38 of 97, .392), Marie O'Malley (33 of 91, .363) are all back. What has changed? There is no more Crown Point Invitational. CP will travel to Illinois for a double-header with Downers Grove South on May 7. Why? When you have a really good team, you need to find some team that is better than you and play them. CP probably had to search the Midwest, but they may have found one. Downers Grove South (DGS) was 36-2 last season (33-3 in 2014), losing to state champion Marist in the Illinois playoffs. Senior left-hander Caroline Hedgecock was 15-1 as a pitcher last year and hit 10 home runs with 68 RBIs. Junior right-hander Payton Buresh is 33-1 the last two seasons. DGS first baseman Kristen Lea (.574, 59 RBIs) smacked out a state record 28 doubles. Senior second baseman Kristen Bialek had 33 stolen bases. In Hedgeock (Arkansas), Bialek (Murray State) and Buresch (James Madison), DGS has three confirmed Division I players.

The two games with arch rival Lake Central (April 6 and May 3) plus DGS, Penn and the Lakeshore Michigan Invitational will highlight the season. In Michigan, CP will face Bremen (4-0) and 6-foot senior right-hander Chelsea Huppert (4-0, 0.15 ERA), who was 20-2 last season. Elish struck out 17 in a 3-0 win over Portage last Friday (4-1-2016) to start the season.

St. JOHN: Lake Central lost the state title game 6-2 to Center Grove last season, but they defeated top-ranked Penn (27-3) twice and second ranked CP (29-3) in post-season play. It was a very good year. Lake Central has junior Madisen Tucker (8-2, 2.44 ERA, 47 strikeouts/20 walks 58 innings) in 2016 back and it will be interesting to see who else gets a lot of innings. LC graduated only five seniors overall, so Alex Hickey (32 of 99, 324, 7 HRs, 29 RBIs), Ciera Novak (27 of 79, .340), Paige Carter (33 of 82, .409) and Maddie Blythe (37 of 101, .368, 23 RBIs) all return. Lake Central's issues with Crown Point will draw larger as CP moves into 4A Sectional 1, making it nearly a certainty that the two teams will meet three times this season. Good for us who watch, but bad for them. LC travels to the Horseshoe Classic at Pendleton Heights on April 9, the Carmel Invitational (April 22-23) and the Franklin Central Invitational April 16.

Lake Central rolled over Munster 9-3 to start the season on March 29. Junior Alex Hickey and sophomore Riley Platusuic were both 3-for-4. Hickey drove in five runs and continued her home run hitting ways with a three-run homer. Senior Julia Schassburger, who pitched only nine innings in 2015, got the start and the victory. That’s LC’s question. Do they have the pitching for a very difficult schedule? Most games won't address this question because this is a top offensive team that’s going to score 10 runs quite a few times. The greatest active streak in Northwest Indiana high school sports continues. LC has won 20 softball games for 28 years in a row.

MUNSTER: Munster turned back Hanover 5-1 to start the season Monday (3-28-2016) with Madelyn (Maddie) Moore launching a 3-run homer. I keep ranking HC ahead of Munster but Munster keeps beating them so I’m going to stop. The Mustang girls tend to be older with seniors like Moore, Jillian Anderson, Kelsie Kasper, Melissa McCann, Amanda Osterhus and Paige Kwasigroch (who pitched the complete-game win over Hanover) playing key roles. Munster’s pitching is going to be the question. Like Hanover, they don’t have the high strikeout pitcher that many top teams have. Like Hanover (and maybe LC) they want to make up for it with good defense and an experienced, productive batting order. Munster lost 9-3 to Lake Central on March 30, being outhit 14-8. You can only be so productive. The bad news for Munster is the move of Crown Point into 4A Sectional 1. That means they could face LC and CP on back to back days at the sectional level. It's going to be very difficult to survive that.

CEDAR LAKE: Hanover Central will continue to be overshadowed by big neighbors Lake Central and Crown Point, but they will continue to win. Left-hander Marley Hanlon (14-9, 2.02 ERA, 107 strikeouts, 11 walks) returns with a very experienced junior class that includes catcher Alexis Mokos (43 of 110, .391), left fielder Alyssa Gill (42 of 109, .385, 6 HR, 29 RBIs) infielder Sophia Barbosa (31 of 86, .360), centerfielder Skylar Barnett (34 of 101, .337), first baseman-designated hitter Dakota Ward (10 of 32, 323 in 11 games) and maybe a couple of surprises.

With all that said, even with its top starting pitcher, 70% of the batting order returning for 2016 and back-to-back regional titles, Hanover needs to be better defensively. Hanlon isn’t the kind of pitcher who will strike out a lot so the plays have to be made behind her. HC can be better than 22-11 and they surely expect to be. The Lady Cats will have to be better to get back to the semistate. Hanover now plays in a five-team sectional where Andrean and KV know them very well and newcomers Twin Lakes and John Glenn come in unknown. The good news? The team that KO’d Hanover in the semistate in each of the last two seasons: Leo, is now a 4A school. But pre-season 3A No.1 St. Joseph’s or 3A No. 7 (Mishawaka) Marian could be the team waiting for Hanover if they reach the Twin Lakes semistate again. HC lost the opener 5-1 to Munster on March 29.

LaPORTE: LaPorte graduated only three seniors from last year’s 19-12 team, so they have high expectations. Junior Kassidy Rosenbaum (44 of 107, .411) had 16 extra base hits and freshman Avery Wolfenbarger (31 of 88, .352) scored a team high 27 runs. Add in junior Bailey Severs (31 of 99, .313) and sophomore Kimani Woodard (26 of 85, .306); pitchers Wolfenbarger (5-2, 2.46 ERA) and Riley Galloway (11-7, 2.09 ERA) and the future seems bright. The Slicers have seven starters and two pitchers back from last year and LaPorte’s good news is: 4A No. 3 Crown Point had been moved from 4A Sectional 2 to 4A Sectional 1. The bad news: (and it's bad) LaPorte has been moved from 4A Sectional 2 to 4A Sectional 3 with pre-season No. 2 Penn. Sorry. There’s no way to sugarcoat this. Penn is rated No. 13 in the nation. LaPorte has to defeat Crown Point and Lake Central in DAC play and then beat Penn in sectional play.

CHESTERTON: It's hard to rate DAC teams in softball because they all have a decent flow of underclassmen. And most all have Division I or Division II players. Valparaiso should be strong, but I’m going to start with CP, LC, LaPorte and Chesterton ahead of them. Senior pitcher Lisa Lombardini, who will be the No.1 pitcher, pitched a no-hitter in Tuesday’s 4-0 win (3-30-2016) over Hobart. Senior Bailey Slivka, who will play at Division II Southern Indiana, batted .424 last year with 24 RBIs. But the key bat may be outfielder Shelby Grimm, a Notre Dane recruit, who hit .390 and batted leadoff last season. Third baseman Kristi Stevenson batted .344 last year. The Trojans have just four seniors, but again, many DAC teams (for that matter, most girls softball teams) don’t have many seniors. Chesterton’s biggest edge? They are in 4A Sectional 2. Second-ranked Penn is in 4A Sectional 3. Third-rated CP and fourth-rated LC are in 4A Sectional 1.

PORTER TOWNSHIP: The best thing that happened to Boone Grove in the off-season is that they did not jump up to Class 3A, a jump which would have put them in the same sectional as rival Hanover Central. Boone won 20 of their last 22 games last season and lost 3-0 in the 2A state title game. Pitcher Amanda Hawrot (15-4, 1.20 ERA, 143 Ks, 33 walks in 111 innings) will be the lead pitcher as the Wolves try to win the Porter County Conference (PCC) again. Sarah Brown (40 of 103, .455) had 18 extra base hits last year as a junior and Taylor Stevens (33 of 82, .402) had 15 extra base hits last year as a sophomore. Hawrot hit .411 with 39 hits in 95 at bats including 11 doubles and five home runs and 35 RBIs. Boone as a team batted .343, a team that graduated no one from last year. Boone needs to play a more difficult schedule and they won't. They don’t have Crown Point, Lake Central, Chesterton or LaPorte on the slate and I wish they did. But Boone didn’t play a tough schedule in 2015 and it didn’t hurt them last season.

(Return to Top)

Copyright © 2016 USA-365.com and Meyer Multimedia Services, a division of Meyer Broadcasting Corp.  All rights reserved.
Revised: April 08, 2016.