Palmer outduels Quigley, Frazier tops Charleroi
By JEREMY SELLEW
jsellew@yourmvi.com
When asked to talk about his freshman pitcher Nicole Palmer, Frazier head coach Don Hartman put it as simply as he could.
“She’s a pitcher, not a freshman.”
Palmer was masterful in the circle, helping pitch the Commodores to at least a share of the Section 3-2A title with a 2-1 win at Charleroi Wednesday.
Palmer allowed only two hits to the heavy-hitting Cougars.
“She has ice in her veins and she keeps some in reserve,” Hartman said. “She was throwing harder, maybe than she was in the whole game, in that seventh inning. It kind of reminds me of someone that grew up in my house and is now pitching at Seton Hill.”
While the reference was to his daughter Logan, as good as Palmer was, Charleroi’s Kylie Quigley nearly matched her pitch for pitch.
“It’s just aggravating because we wasted such a great outing by Kylie,” Charleroi coach Trey Tilghman said. “Palmer is going to be a tough out the next four years. But Kylie was just fantastic today.”
In the losing effort, Quigley allowed only three hits.
“We knew today was going to be a battle and that Quigley really gets up to pitch against us,” Hartman said. “She was great.”
In a game eerily similar to the teams’ first meeting, a 5-4 win for the Commodores, it was Frazier taking the early lead.
Jensyn Hartman started out the game with a hard-hit liner into the left-field corner for a double. After Maria Felsher’s sacrifice bunt moved Hartman to third, Tori Washinski followed with a pivotal at-bat.
The senior shortstop fell behind Quigley 0-2 before battling through a 13-pitch sequence and drawing a walk. She fouled off seven pitches to stay alive.
After she took second on defensive indifference, Quigley was able to strike out Delaney Warnick for the second out.
Rylee Evans followed and lofted a 2-0 pitch into right field. Rece Eddy came on and made a diving attempt, but the ball trickled out of her glove allowing Hartman and Washinski to score to give the Commodores (10-3, 7-0) the 2-0 lead.
“Tori’s at-bat was the key. It was huge for us,” Hartman said. “She did a great job of battling there until she drew the walk. It was a big one because she was the winning run.”
Palmer sat down the first 10 Cougars’ hitters she faced and didn’t run into trouble until the fourth.
After retiring Leena Henderson on a groundout to second, Palmer hit Rece Eddy with a pitch to give Charleroi (7-7, 4-3) its first baserunner of the game.
McKenna DeUnger followed with a soft liner into left for the first Cougars’ hit and put runners at first and second. But Palmer settled down and got clean-up hitter Jocelyn Polonoli to ground to Warnick at third, who touched the bag for the second out. Sofia Celaschi followed and struck out swinging on four pitches for Palmer to get out of the jam.
“We had a really good chance there in the fourth inning with runners on first and second and one out. We couldn’t get that one big hit we needed,” an aggravated Tilghman said.
The Cougars finally broke through and got a run on the board when Henderson reached on an error on a short little pop-up at the back of the pitcher’s circle. Palmer was charged with the lone Commodores’ error on the play.
Two batters later, it was DeUnger again coming through, this time sending a deep fly ball to right that hit off the fence for a double. Henderson scored to make it 2-1.
“Boots almost had it,” Tilghman said. “I thought that was gone. But still, she was at second and we couldn’t come through.”
Palmer struck out Polonoli to get the third out of the inning.
After Quigley retired the bottom third of the Frazier order easily in the top of the seventh, Palmer one-upped her by striking out Celaschi and Quigley before Jensyn Hartman made a spectacular catch near the backstop on Maddie Lancy’s foul ball to end the game.
Hartman applauded the play of second baseman Maria Felsher, who made five put-outs in the game, including a diving catch on a spinning pop-up by Quigley in the fifth.
“Second base was a question mark for us going into the season and Maria and Madison Bednar have been great there. Both have made some great plays to win us games there,” Hartman said. “Today, she was fantastic there. Even on the error by Nicole, I thought Felsh was going to come up with another sliding grab there.
“And it was the battle we thought this game would be. We played without Madison and Felsh stepped up big and Nicole was great in the circle. The wind up here was atrocious and it was havoc on fly balls, but it helped us there on DeUnger’s hit.
“Charleroi’s a great team and they have some great young players over there. They’re set up for a run in the playoffs and I really hope we don’t see them again.”
Palmer finished with 10 strikeouts and didn’t walk a batter. Quigley struck out eight and walked three.
Both teams will face Carmichaels in their next games with the Cougars scheduled to travel there Friday, while the Commodores will host the Mikes Monday. Both games are scheduled for 4:15 p.m. starts.
