With a relatively experienced team, Center Grove softball coach Alyssa Coleman says she’d prefer to toss them into the deep end against top-quality competition, see what happens and then coach them up from there.
She and the Trojans are more concerned with the big picture, so the short-term fallout — a 4-0 loss at Class 4A No. 2 Roncalli on Wednesday — was of little concern.
Even if it was the first loss in 714 days for the third-ranked Trojans.
“We got better today,” Coleman said. “It’s all fixable. I mean, it’s plain and simple — all of their runs are on us. We can own them. I’m going to choose my team all day.”
Giving up any runs against the Royals is problematic when Keagan Rothrock is in the pitching circle. The sophomore from Whiteland had been nearly untouchable in her first two high school outings and was just as tough Wednesday, striking out 15 without a walk and allowing just three hits.
The Royals (3-0) took a first-inning lead with some timely hits and the help of a little good fortune.
After Chloe Parks reached on an infield single, Lyla Blackwell hit a bouncer back to Alexis Rudd but, on a play that evoked memories of Alex Rodriguez in the 2004 American League Championship Series, knocked the ball loose as first baseman Maya Netter applied the tag in front of the bag, allowing Parks to come around for the game’s first run. Hits by Kylie Freije and Rothrock then pushed Blackwell across to make it 2-0.
That was all that Rothrock — who has now fanned 45, walked none and yielded just four hits in her first 18 1/3 innings of high school softball — needed to secure what Roncalli coach David Lauck called “a signature win for our program.”
“It makes it a lot easier,” Rothrock said of pitching with a lead. “It makes it a lot more fun to play, too.”
The lone offensive threat for Center Grove (5-1) came in the top of the fourth, when Ashlynn Wolff dropped a leadoff single into right field, stole second and moved to third on a Rudd groundout. Rothrock left Wolff there with a strikeout of Emma Fair, her 10th of the game.
Roncalli then added another run in the bottom of the frame on an Abby Hofmann double, a couple of bunts and a bases-loaded sac fly by Parks.
Parks knocked in an insurance run in the sixth, plating Cate Lehner with a two-out triple.
Though the Royals got the better of Center Grove in this early-season affair, both coaches seemed to hint that a second meeting in the postseason was a high possibility.
“I would not be surprised if we played them in late May or June again,” Lauck said.
For her part, Coleman is already planning on getting another crack at Rothrock and the Royals.
“It’s going to take a very special team to beat her,” Coleman said, “and I know our team’s special, so we’ll figure something out.”
