Fairfield takes third at state tourney

FORT DODGE ? Fairfield?s lone senior made the best of her final high school softball game, as Alli Deao collected three hits at the plate, three RBIs and allowed only one hit in the circle, leading the Trojans to a third place finish after a 10-0 five-inning victory over Boone on Friday.

?It feels great, really great,? said Deao. ?My offspeed pitches really helped a lot. The bat finally came around for me today. I?m pretty satisfied with my high school career and I don?t think it?ll sink in until I don?t wake up and go to practice tomorrow. This was a great group of girls and I?m glad I got to finish my senior year and my career with them, and I?ll never forget it.?

?You could not write a script any better than that to end a career,? said Fairfield head coach Bob Bradfield. ?Like a lot of our hitters, Alli?s been on and off. Up until the state tournament, she?d been in a little bit of a slump, and she really came out of it today. She ended her career as well as anyone could ever ask for.?

Kenady Waugh also had three RBIs for the Trojans and the junior shortstop blasted her second homer of the tournament, a three-run shot, in the third inning to make it 7-0. Also collecting RBIs at the plate for the Trojans were Brynna Bowman, Kaylee Watson, Ashtyn Drish and Natalie Angstead.

?It felt awesome ? I knew off the bat that it was going to be a really good hit,? said Waugh. ?Hitting that homer made us realize that we had this game. We scored more runs, so that was great. Our goal was to win the state championship, but after the loss [to Oskaloosa], we were able to just come out and have fun and win the last game.

?I?m so excited for Alli; I?ve been playing behind her since I was 10 and I?m so glad to see her go out like this.?

The Toreadors, who defeated Bishop Heelan 11-2 in the opening round and lost a heartbreaker to top-seed Carlisle 9-8 on Thursday, looked sluggish at the plate and in the field, committing three errors. Boone starter Breanna Hunter escaped a first-inning jam with a strikeout of Sara Trent to keep the game scoreless.

Fairfield earned its first runs of the game in the second inning. Haley Beard led off with a double and moved up to third on a single by Shay Drish. Deao then singled to drive in Beard and Drish was thrown out at third base on the play. Hunter struck out Angstead, but the Trojans followed with consecutive singles by Waugh, Bowman, Watson, Ashtyn Drish, and Trent drew a walk before Hunter finally coaxed Beard into flying out to left to end the inning with Fairfield up 4-0.

The Trojans salted the game away in the fourth inning. Trent led off the inning with a double and Beard walked to put two on. A sacrifice bunt by Shay Drish put the runners in scoring position for Deao, who smashed a double to drive in Lily Hoskins and Jillian Dunlap, the flex and pinch runners respectively. Angstead drove in the deciding run with a single, scoring Taylor Myers, who was running for Deao. Boone went down 1-2-3 in the final inning on two groundouts and a flyout.

?It feels great to come away with this win,? said Bradfield. ?It?s great for the girls. It?s a whole different atmosphere for us. The girls are sleeping in a dorm room instead of their own beds and you never know how teams will play at the state tournament. We knew Boone had a good hitting team and obviously Alli pitched great, allowing only one hit. They were hitting the ball all over the place in that game against Carlisle, so it goes to show you that you never know and that?s why you play the game.

?I thought we could hit their pitcher and we?ve faced a lot of girls like her this year and we didn?t look as successful against.?

After the celebration, Bradfield and the Trojans will look to the future and starting the path to the state tournament next year, led by a slew of juniors with loads of experience in Waugh, Bowman, Watson, Angstead, Ashytn Drish , Sara Trent, Beard and more.

?Defensively, you won?t find very many shortstops in the state as good as Kenady,? he said. ?She?s obviously a good hitter too, with two home runs at the state tournament. We knew she had power after her first two varsity at-bats as an eighth-grader where she hit two home runs. We?ve got five junior starters coming back and they?re all good ballplayers, so hopefully they take the horse by the reins and realize their last year is coming up. All of them are good players, but they can all get better.?

?Brynna?s been up around the .400 mark hitting-wise for two or three years now,? he said. ?She?ll bunt for us to move runners, can bunt for a base hit and she can swing away. She?s a very dangerous No. 2 hitter for us.

?Kaylee and Sara are both power hitters and very good defensively,? he said. ?We have some very good players coming back next year. Sara?s proven to handle the pitching staff well and Kaylee?s a great defensive center fielder for us.

?We were ready for Haley to go in today if we needed her, but it worked out that Alli pitched great and we got it done in five innings,? he said. ?She?s a competitor and always wants to get out there and we?re looking forward to having that next year from her.

?We knew coming in to the season that we had an open outfield spot and a second base spot,? he said. ?Third base was open as well, but I knew that Ashtyn Drish had the athleticism and the capability to play third, so she was always slotted in to be there after her freshman season.?

Mixed in with that group is a pair of eighth-graders who really solidified Bradfield?s lineup this year and have him excited for the future.

?Lily?s done a great job on defense for us all year long in left, and she didn?t get to bat much this year,? he said. ?Shay?s been a great second baseman for us all year long. I couldn?t have predicted they?d stay that steady and they haven?t physically matured yet. They?re strong for eighth-graders and they?ll be good hitters. Shay has already shown flashes of that hitting ability for us.?

The Trojans finish the season with a 29-12 record, including the third-place finish at the state tournament. The only senior leaving the program from graduation is Deao, and her final stats on the year are: 15-8 record; .237 opponent batting average; 89 strikeouts; 11 walks; 1.65 earned run average; .240 batting average; 14 RBIs and five doubles.