Sports

Softball: Cougars Advance to Concorde Title Game

Oakton earns spot in district final with 10-0 rout over Robinson

Looking to avenge their one district loss during the regular season, the Oakton High softball team shut out the Robinson Rams for a 10-0 in the Concorde District Tournament semifinals.

After a scoreless first inning, the Cougars jumped to a 5-0 lead in the second. Senior Hayley French led off with a line drive double to center field, and senior Angie Noviello laid down a sacrifice bunt to move French to third. But it turned out playing small ball would not be necessary, as Alana Peters smashed her first home run of her varsity career over the left field wall to earn the Cougars their first two runs. 

The inning continued with Mary Kate Mehegan drawing a walk, Becky Cerva doing the same two batters later and Allison Davis earning first to load the bases. Emily Krisanda, who leads the team in RBI this season, hit a bases clearing double to put the Cougars at 5-0.

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In the third inning, French again led off with a hit, this time a triple down the third base line. Two batters later, Mehegan hit an RBI single to score French for a 6-0 lead.

The Cougars tacked on a seventh run in the fourth inning off an RBI single from Peters to score Krisanda, who had reached base on a walk and moved to third on a sacrifice bunt from Krage and a line drive single from French. 

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The Cougars continued their streak of scoring each inning since the second with two runs in the fifth. Becky Cerva hit a double to centerfield to score Corridon, who hit a single to get on base. Two batters later, Krage hit a sacrifice bunt to score Cerva for a 9-0 lead. 

In the sixth inning, Peters book-ended the Cougars' scoring with her second home run of both the game and the season, this one a solo shot again over the left field wall. 

"It felt absolutely amazing. I just wanted to help out my team. Getting the home run, it just felt so amazing and I knew it as soon as I hit it," Peters, a sophomore, said. "The first one was on two outs and I just wanted to get a base hit and help out the team. I guess it just focused me more and I hit in the right spot."

Before creating the lineup, Coach Ray Gordon had gone through all that statistics of the Cougars' last two meetings against Robinson — the last of which they lost 4-0. He noticed Peters had two hits off pitcher Lauren Stapleton in their first matchup and a hard-hit groundout in their second matchup.

"I told her before the game, 'You can hit this girl. She throws the kind of pitch you can hit,'" Gordon said. "We've been kind of struggling in the eight-spot all year, and she was relaxed. She doesn't get to play a lot but I looked in the book, and Alana had good swings against them."

Perhaps the unsung hero of the Cougars' rout, third baseman French went 3 for 3 with one walk — a home run shy of the cycle — and scored two runs. 

"She was responsible for our big innings," Gordon said. "If you ask me, she was the MVP of the game."

The Cougars' starting pitcher Allison Davis worked a complete game shutout with seven strikeouts to put her at 147 total strikeouts in 2012. She ranks 11th in strikeouts in the Metro area and first among the Concorde District, according to AllMetSports.com.

The Cougars will compete for the Concorde District Championship against the Chantilly Chargers at 6:30 p.m. Monday at Chantilly High. 

"We really feel it's our year. Oakton hasn't been doing well in the past few years, but we've been doing really well this season and want to get the title," Peters said.


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