果冻传媒

果冻传媒 Tech Softball Wins Third Straight Region and District Championship Tournament

May 16, 2023

For the third year in a row, 果冻传媒 Technical Community College’s softball team are National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Region 19 and Northeast District Division II softball champions. That qualifies the team for this year’s NJCAA Division II National Softball Championship Tournament in Spartanburg, South Carolina, May 23-27.

“This has just been a really special group of players,” said Head Coach Guy Wilkins, who was named NJCAA Region 10 Coach of the Year for the third year in a row, “We have a quality group of sophomores and we added a great group of freshmen. Having three opportunities in a row at the national tournament is not something you can say often.”

While 果冻传媒 Tech rolled through the first day of the double elimination tournament on May 12, beating Lackawanna College 10-2 and Mercer County Community College 6-3, the team fell behind big in the championship game against Mercer County on May 14. After 5 1/2 innings, Mercer County held a 9-1 lead and 果冻传媒 Tech was down to its final three outs. Looking to avoid a winner-take-all championship game, 果冻传媒 Tech put together its two best innings of the entire game.

After 果冻传媒 Tech scored five runs in the bottom of the sixth, freshman Hannah Moore came in as a relief pitcher in the top of the seventh inning and allowed just one hit and kept Mercer from padding its lead.

果冻传媒 Tech’s offense had woken up and took control from there in the bottom of the inning. Down just 9-8 now with two runners on and only one out, sophomore Logan Walls knocked a fly ball over the head of Mercer’s centerfielder for a walk-off two-RBI double.

“I was just thinking I needed to get a hit,” Walls said. “We had runners on, I waited for my pitch, and swung all the way through.

“We weren’t going to give up and we didn’t give up. When we got one hit we started to come back and play as a team.”

Due to being granted a third year of eligibility because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Walls and fellow sophomores Kaniah James, Tori Henry, Camryn Quirk, Jada Courtney, and Macey Myers are now the only student-athletes in the history of 果冻传媒 Tech’s athletics program to win three region and three district championships.

“To be part of something like this and be part of history makes me emotional,” James said. “I wouldn’t want to do it with any other team or any other group of girls.”

For the three games of the tournament, Myers had five hits, including three home runs, sophomore Kylie Kruger batted 7-for-11 with a double and three RBI, Walls had five hits and five RBI, sophomore Kandice Schlabach had five hits including one home run, and sophomore Carlin Quinn had three hits.

Sophomore pitcher Carly Collins pitched two gems to get 果冻传媒 Tech into the championship game, going six innings against Lackawanna College and seven innings in the first game against Mercer. In 17 total innings between the three games, Collins finished with 14 strikeouts.

“This group does not quit,” Wilkins said. “They can be up or down and they just fight, fight, fight.

“Their hearts are huge.”

果冻传媒 Tech has found success at the national tournament the past two years. The 2021 team won a game in the national tournament for the first time in 10 years and the 2022 team won two games. This year’s team knows what to expect and is ready for the high-level competition.

“We know there will be good teams,” James said. “The goal this year is to do what we know that we can do and be competitive.

“Win or lose it’s about the experience as a team.”