Softball: Reagan Stoudt, St. Bede win one for coach

PERU – St. Bede coach Shawn Sons was ill and unable to take his spot in the Bruins’ dugout and third base coach’s box for Monday’s game at the Academy’s Abbot Philip Davey Field.

His Bruins made him feel a lot better with a 5-0 Tri-County Conference win over Woodland/Flanagan-Cornell.

Reagan Stoudt did it at the plate with a 2-for-2 day and four RBIs and in the circle, earning the victory with a three-hit shutout.

While it was weird not having Sons there, Stoudt said the Bruins are well prepared for any circumstance.

“We definitely missed him,” Stoudt said. “When I showed up I said, ‘Where’s coach?’ It’s hard when your head coach isn’t here. Plus it was super quiet without the [pregame] music. [Assistant coach] Jake [Sons] runs that, and he wasn’t here. So we really missed them today.

“We all know what he wants us to do. He’s engraved that in our brains. We go through the motions. And we just know.”

Assistant coach Rob Ruppert, a former head coach who led the Bruins to a third-place finish in 2019, said it was business as usual.

“That’s the good thing about our team. [The coaching staff is] all pretty well versed on what we do around here. And the girls are pretty comfortable with us,” he said. “Anybody can run the team. With a team like we have, the girls play hard. Just put them out there and let them go.”

Senior shortstop Ella Hermes got the Bruins going with a deep triple down the right field line to lead off the bottom of the first inning. Catcher Bella Pinter was hit by a pitch with one out, and Stoudt followed with a two-strike double to left to drive in both base runners to give herself a 2-0 lead.

[ Photo gallery: St. Bede vs. WFC softball ]

Stoudt, who especially liked her two-strike hit because “I normally don’t do that,” said it was nice to get out to a quick lead.

“We really haven’t been good at getting up first. We like chasing. I don’t know why, but we really do. That was nice to get up,” she said.

The Bruins (17-2, 8-0) had another two-run inning in the third. Lily Bosnich hit a two-out single to center and Pinter doubled to left. Stoudt ripped a line drive single to center to plate both runners to make it 4-0.

The biggest win of the inning for the Bruins was having Hermes shrug off a hard collision with WFC first baseman Kaylee Henert on a pop-up between first and home. Hermes was called out for interference.

A little small ball led to an insurance run for the Bruins in the bottom of the sixth. Maddie Dalton reached on a two-base error on a dropped fly to right field. Lily McClain bunted her to third, and Bailey Engels brought her home with a safety squeeze to make it 5-0.

“We struggled a little bit offensively, but we scored enough to win the game,” Ruppert said. “We left the bases juiced one inning. That kind of hurt a little bit. We got a couple of bunts down that got us in position to score some runs. We did what we had to do.

“You can’t win every game by 10 runs. You just play hard and let the chips fall.”

Stoudt scattered three hits and three walks, striking out 11 to raise her record to 7-2.

“The last time we played them we put a few more [runs] on. But we came off a weekend off,” Stoudt said. “We played good. Our energy was a little bit off. Weren’t really stringing things together, but in the moments where it mattered, we showed up.”

WFC coach Mike Hoekstra was pleased to see the Warriors (9-8, 4-7) make improvement from a 12-0 loss previously to the Bruins.

“We did a lot better today. They got us 12-0 the first time we played them. Don’t like to lose a game, but we’re happy with the result against a quality team like that,” he said. “We had some young girls playing with us today and a couple subs filling in, too, to get us through. So it’s good. We had a good approach at the plate and some quality at-bats.

“Any time you can compete with a team like that, it’s good for the team.”

Hermes and Stoudt each had two hits for the Bruins.

Jaylei Leininger, Shae Simons and Aubry Edens each had one hit for the Warriors.