JEROMESVILLE - Kennedy Fickes kept up her mastery in the circle Saturday as she tossed a four-hitter ball in five innings to lead the Hillsdale softball team to a 5-1 win over Chippewa in Wayne County Athletic League action on Senior Day on Saturday.
Hillsdale, at 13-0 in WCAL play, and 19-3 overall, has won the outright league title. Chippewa is at 6-7, 13-7, respectively.
Four Lady Falcon seniors were honored before the game in Lilyan Amend, Belle Dalton, Mollie Goon, and Jacey Sermulis.
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Fickes tossed her usual effective game by fanning five, walking none, and yielding just one earned run on four hits in five innings of work. She also aided her own cause with the bat, driving in a run with a deep sacrifice fly to center in the first inning, plating her cousin, Jordyn Fickes who had walked.
Kennedy Fickes also had an RBI-single in the bottom of the third inning when Hillsdale scored three runs, with Amend belting a double and Goon adding an RBI-single.
‘Everybody was feeling pretty good today, even in warmups, everything felt good, and I did throw everything pretty well,” Kennedy Fickes said. “And my defense made some great plays. We had a great defensive game.”
None more so than the one gem Jordyn Fickes made in the top of the fifth inning when she ran to her right in center field, speared a liner, then wheeled and threw back to second to catch a Chippewa runner straying too far off the bag for a double-play to end the inning.
“That was a great catch,” Kennedy Ficked praised. “If that had gotten down it could have scored a couple of runs and she was able to get the double play out of it, and she made a great play.”
Laci Huber singled to center in the third inning for Hillsdale and Willow Funk followed with an RBI double to plate the final run for the Falcons.
Chippewa’s only run came in the first inning when Annie Henegar led off with a perfect bunt single and would score on Ava Panaciulli’s single, her first of three hits on the day.
“Ava’s a true softball player, she’s one of the best hitters we’ve got and have had in the program in a long time,” lauded Chippewa coach Glen Regan. “If she wants to play at the next level she definitely can.”
Regan’s daughter, Sky, tossed effective ball for the Lady Chipps, tossing six innings with four strikeouts, six walks, yielding five runs (two earned) on seven hits.
“She did a great job of pitching in the circle today, I thought she was able to keep them off-balanced, we got a lot of pop-ups, and we made some plays behind her,” coach Regan said. “I think we were one wet ball, one dropped ball away from it being a 2-1 game.”
Dalton belted a pair of doubles for Hillsdale and felt Kennedy Fickes threw strong once again.
“She’s been working up to this moment, she really saved us a lot of outs, and I’m just really proud of her, she;s worked her butt off this year,” lauded Dalton, who added the four Falcon seniors are hoping to have a deep playoff run. “We’ve all been so close for so long, even when we went to the Final Four, we all felt like we all went, and we know what it feels like, so we’re just trying to push these young girls to know what it’s like to get that far.It means a lot to me we’ve stuck together and made a close chemistry with us and bringing it to the rest of the team.”
Hillsdale coach Hannah Moore had nothing but praise for her quartet of seniors.
“They’re a very hardworking group, and have kept the Hillsdale tradition alive, they keep going at it each and every day,” Moore offered. ”They’ve taken on a lot of responsibility this year and I’m really proud of them, and I can’t wait to see what they do after high school.”
This article originally appeared on Ashland Times Gazette: Kennedy Fickes shines to pace Hillsdale in WCAL win over Chippewa
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