Seneca senior Camryn Stecken was surprised with how St. Bede’s Macy Strauch pitched her in Stecken’s first at-bat Tuesday.

Stecken saw what she was expecting in her second at-bat.

“My first at-bat she went inside on me, which I wasn’t really expecting,” Stecken said. “Then (in my second at-bat) I saw that fastball outside, so I knew I was going to go on that one. That was my plan all game.”

Stecken smacked the pitch over the center-field fence for a two-run home run that landed on the roof of a car, just a couple down from her parents’ truck.

“I almost hit my dad’s truck, which would have been bad,” Stecken said. “I don’t know who I hit, but I do feel bad if I cracked their windshield.”

While Stecken’s shot may or may not have damaged a vehicle, it did spark the Fighting Irish in their Tri-County Conference opener. The homer was part of a four-run inning that pushed the Seneca lead to six, and the Irish kept adding on in an 11-1, five-inning victory.

“Definitely (it gave us momentum),” Stecken said. “I feel like when something like that happens or we get a (defensive) play, it just gets us going.”

Stecken said the Irish were motivated going into the third inning after a controversial call in the bottom half of the second. St. Bede’s Ella Burke hit the ball to shallow left field and raced for second. She was initially ruled out at second base, but the call was overturned.

Seneca pitcher Tessa Krull struck out the next three batters to avoid any damage.

“There was the play on defense that we thought we had the out, and it got switched,” Stecken said. “We knew after that play we had to mean business.”

The Irish tacked on after Stecken’s homer.

Hayden Pfeifer and Krull followed Stecken with singles. With two outs, Marlie Lissy brought in a run with a fielder’s choice, and Graysen Provance hit a slap single for an RBI.

The Irish scored three in the fourth on a two-run single by Pfeifer and an RBI groundout by Lissy. Seneca ended the game in the fifth with RBI singles by Pfeifer and Lexie Buis.

“We like to baserun, not necessarily play the long game, but Cam got us going, and we had a couple other big hits there to get us four (in the third) to make it 6-0,” Irish coach Brian Holman said. “We were fortunate we kind of kept going.

“(Hitting) is something we work on a ton. Once we settle in and start taking changeups and sitting on our pitches, we’re tough. I’m not easy on them, but they handle it well, and they did a good job tonight.”

The six-run lead was more than enough for Krull. The senior ace allowed one run on four hits while striking out 10 and walking. She retired the final eight batters she faced.

“Once it was 6-0, from there it’s hard against Tessa to string anything together,” Holman said.

The Bruins had two baserunners in the first inning, the leadoff batter on second in the second and scored their lone run in the third on a single by Emma Slingsby and an RBI double by Lili McClain.

“There were one or two balls early where they could have taken the lead and then we’re battling from behind,” Holman said. “Sometimes (Krull) works into it. It’s not that she didn’t have her good stuff (early in the game), but you saw the really good stuff at the end. She was unhittable the last two innings.”

McClain had two of St. Bede’s four hits, while Strauch took the loss in the circle.

“Seneca is a really good team,” St. Bede coach Rob Ruppert said. “They have a really good pitcher. We had some opportunities early, and we didn’t get the job done. We kind of let it get away from us, but they’re not ranked third in the state for no reason. They hit the ball well. They’re very disciplined at the plate.

“I said to my girls after the game, ‘That’s what a good team is.’ We want to be there. We have to work.”

The teams will meet again Thursday in Seneca.

“We came in here knowing this was probably going to be one of our harder games in conference, and I think we handled it well,” Stecken said. “It gives us a good feel not just for conference play, but in general. St. Bede is a really good team. They have some really fast girls. They have girls who can hit, so it’s really good for us to be able to get that win as a team.”