St. Michael scores first-round win over Fredonia
Navajo Times | Quentin Jodie
St. Michael third baseman Aaliyah Bob gets ready to throw the ball to first base against Red Mesa on April 23 in Fort Defiance. The Lady Cardinals play top-seeded Bagdad Sultans in the second round of the 1A state playoffs on Wednesday.
WINDOW ROCK – The St. Michael softball team needed just five innings to overpower No. 8 Fredonia on the road in the first round of the 1A state playoffs.
The ninth-seeded Lady Cardinals advanced to Wednesday’s quarterfinals with a 20-5 victory last Friday afternoon. Earlier this season, St. Michael had come up short to Fredonia in a 1A North Region doubleheader on April 13.
“This was a really big win,” first-year St. Michael coach Julianne Billiman said. “We had a couple of people from our school make the five-hour trip to Fredonia, and we had most of the parents show up.”
The Cardinals will now make the six-hour trip to top-seeded Bagdad on Wednesday. First pitch is scheduled for 3 p.m. (MST)
The winner of that contest advances to the 1A state semifinal Friday at 4 p.m., which will take place at the Papago Softball Complex in Scottsdale, Arizona. The championship game is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Saturday at the same venue.
In that earlier meeting with Fredonia, the St. Michael team played without most of their seniors who were testing for the ACT exam.
“I was out that game too because of an illness, so this was a fulfilling win for everyone,” Billiman said. “We proved what we could do, and I think we kind of shocked Fredonia in how we turned it around.”
In five innings of work, St. Michael ace Denae Livingston struck out eight batters and walked two.
“Our pitcher was on the ball for that game,” Billiman said of her sophomore right-handed pitcher. “She did a good job of moving the ball around. She pitched inside and then she would change it up and throw outside, so she worked that strike zone.”
The St. Michael coach credited senior catcher Siara Manuelito for working with Livingston.
“She really helped Denae reign in the ball,” Billiman said. “She helped her stay in the strike zone and Autumn got our final out when she threw down to my shortstop.”
Right fielder Siara Manuelito set the tone for St. Michael with a spectacular catch in the opening frame.
“I think Fredonia was hoping to kick-start their hits, but Siara robbed them with the ball she caught,” Billiman said.
Offensively, St. Michael scattered 10 hits against Fredonia’s two pitchers: sophomore Vasey Yellowhorse and freshman Danni Walters.
Yellowhorse gave up eight runs on three hits while Walters surrendered 12 runs on seven hits.
Most of those runs came in the third frame when St. Michael plated 12 runs, getting the separation it needed.
“Chanelle Hale had some really good hits, especially when we needed them,” Billiman said. “She struggled during the season but in that game she really turned it around and brought in a lot of crucial hits for us.”
Billiman is hoping her club can carry over that success into Wednesday’s game with Bagdad, as the Sultans will most likely start senior ace Nuvia Jauregui, who has an ERA of 2.43. Jauregui leads the five-man pitching staff with 118 strikeouts.
“We don’t have much film on them, but (Jauregui) likes to pitch a lot inside,” Billiman said. “We’ve been working on hitting that inside pitch in practice. We did a lot of pitching machine work today (Monday).”
Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow