For most high school pitchers, earning 247 strikeouts would be considered a pretty good career number.
Well, Emma Penniman just did that during a 20-game regular season.
The senior captain piled up 10 more during Triton’s regular season finale on Monday morning, leading her team to a 4-2 victory on the road at Manchester Essex. Just some simple math here, but that’s an average of a rather ridiculous 12.4 strikeouts per game this year for Penniman, who already has over 700 for her career and isn’t done quite yet.
Now heading into the playoffs, Triton (14-6) has won seven in a row.
The Vikings were the No. 23 seed in Division 3 when the latest rankings came out last Friday morning, and are a team that no top seed would want to see in the fist round. Especially considering they’re a program that was in the Final Four just two years ago, and made it back to the quarterfinals before losing in heartbreaking fashion last spring.
Tied at 2-2 in the top of the sixth inning on Monday, it was Penniman (2-for-3, RBI) starting the rally with a one-out single. Jillian Giusto (2-for-3) would then blast an RBI-double to left field, followed by Ava Johnson crushing a run-scoring double to almost exactly the same spot. Then elsewhere, both Addi Ewell and Maddie January also had hits for the red-hot Vikings, and Laura Zahornasky was praised for her defense in left field.
PENTUCKET: LeBel throws fourth straight shutout
The next time Pentucket plays, it’ll be over two weeks since Molly LeBel last allowed a run.
And it’ll also be the first round of the Division 3 playoffs.
The Panthers wrapped up one of the program’s best regular seasons in history on Monday afternoon, blanking town neighbor Haverhill, 7-0. LeBel, the senior captain, completed the four-hitter with 10 strikeouts and no walks, and in the process earned her fourth straight shutout and eighth total on the year. The Panthers (18-2) have now blanked Hamilton-Wenham, Ipswich, Lynnfield and Haverhill in consecutive games entering the playoffs.
Where they figure to be a major factor.
When the latest power rankings were released last Friday morning, Pentucket was the No. 9 seed in Division 3. Ideally, the Panthers would want to jump up one more spot to earn the right to two home playoff games, so we’ll see if Monday’s win will provide enough of the boost when the official MIAA brackets get released on Wednesday. They currently sit 0.082 percentage points behind No. 8 Gloucester.
But while LeBel was light’s out once again on the holiday, the offense gave her plenty of support while the defense behind her didn’t make an error. Both Kam Bonneau (3 RBI) and Kayla Murphy (2 RBI) went 3-for-4 with triples, while Mia Bartholomew and Michaela Gabardi were both 2-for-3.