Tyrone takes down rival B-A

04/23/24 Mirror photo by Patrick Waksmunski /
Tyrone’s Amariah Sprankle signals her bench after tripling.

By Michael Boytim

mboytim@altoonamirror.com

BELLWOOD — The Tyrone Area and Bellwood-Antis girls softball teams have had their share of successes historically, but both teams have been working through a rebuilding stage the last few seasons.

Making it even more challenging for the squads is playing in the new Laurel Highlands Athletic Conference which features plenty of talented bigger schools from the former Mountain League.

The result is that as the teams improve, sometimes it’s important to look beyond the win and loss columns when looking for the evidence of the strides being made.

“From the beginning of the year, we have improved a lot,” Tyrone coach Hilary Soellner said. “It isn’t reflected in our record. It’s about trying to keep them keeping their eyes on the next game and not trying to look at the overall record and trying to take it inning by inning, game by game and creating smaller goals to try and get us back into the swing of things and into competition for a playoff spot.”

The Lady Eagles took a step toward that on Tuesday with a 10-5 win over their rival Lady Blue Devils at George O. Martin Memorial Field.

“It feels really good,” Tyrone shortstop Amariah Sprankle said. “All of our girls came together, and we played really well. Once we get rolling, if we play as a team we can be pretty good and make it far.”

Sprankle went 2-for-4, scored three runs and doubled off the very top of the fence in the deepest part of the field.

“I thought I got it, and everyone else said they started running out (to greet me at home),” Sprankle said. “I was so excited, and then it hit the very top of the fence. It’s okay though, I still got a good hit out of it.”

That’s the perspective both coaches at Tuesday’s game like to see out of their improving teams.

“We call them moral victories,” Bellwood-Antis coach Heather Quick said. “Sometimes it’s about keeping a team’s runs down or getting a certain amount of hits. It’s hard getting beat a lot, and it’s hard to be positive. But they are adjusting and do okay with that. It’s tough playing 5A and 4A teams. We are hanging with some of them, but sometimes we have that one bad inning where the wheels fall off.”

The Lady Blue Devils have already won more games than last year and have been much more competitive overall.

“We love that we’re growing, and we just said in the huddle that it’s baby steps that we need to build off,” Quick said. “We like that they are getting better. They see that they are getting better, and every bit helps. It gives us some momentum going into these games.”

London McKee went 2-for-3 and had a two-run triple against Tyrone. She also scored the game-tying run in the third inning on an error to make the score 5-5.

Tyrone battled back with two runs in the fourth highlighted by an RBI single by Ally McNelis. The Lady Eagles added three more runs in the sixth inning with RBI singles by Samantha Shaw and Tiffanie Tuskovich.

“We had our JV team with us today too, and that brings the energy up,” Soellner said. “It’s always a competitive game against Bellwood, and it’s always a game we want to win. The girls played together, played well, battled and came out with the win today.”

Lainey Quick is one of only a few seniors for Bellwood-Antis this season and went 1-for-2 with a walk and scored two runs.

“The future is bright,” Quick said. “Our pitcher is a freshman, and we’re probably going to ride her this year. We have another younger girl who has been working too. We have some good kids that are going to be coming up. We have a catcher that’s going to free up our current catcher to play somewhere else and help our defense. I think in the next year or two we’ll make some noise, and people will talk about Bellwood softball again.”

TYRONE (10): Rockwell p 511, Beeman cf 411, Sprankle ss 432, Dibert 1b 422, Shaw 3b 422, Fogelman c 200, Naylor cr 010, McNelis 2b 302, Cramer dp 301, Tuskovich lf 201, Harper rf-flex 000. Totals — 31-10-12.

BELLWOOD-ANTIS (5): Martin c 411, Quick cf 221, Gregg p 310, McKee ss 312, Garman 3b 300, Focht 1b 300, Moore 2b 200, McCahan 2b 000, Hinish lf 100, Laird lf 200, Evans rf 301. Totals — 26-5-5.

SCORE BY INNINGS

Tyrone 410 203 0–10 12 3

Bellwood-Antis 203 000 0–5 5 2

2B–Sprankle, Cramer. 3B–McKee. RBI–Dibert 2, Sprankle, Shaw, Fogleman, McNelis, Cramer, Tuskovich, McKee 2.

PITCHING

Tyrone: Rockwell (W)–7 IP, 5H, 2BB, 1HBP, 6K, 5R, 1ER, 89 pitches.

Bellwood-Antis: Gregg (L)–7 IP, 12H, 7BB, 1HBP, 6K, 10R, 10ER, 174 pitches.

Umpires: John Bronson (HP); Lynn Smith (bases).

Records: Tyrone (4-6); Bellwood-Antis (2-8).