LIGONIER – Big sticks at the plate made up for a big chill in the field for Wawasee’s softball team Tuesday afternoon. Scoring a numbing 17 runs in the first two frames, Wawasee had more than enough offense to make up for shaky defense in a 22-9 win at West Noble.

Wawasee’s Paige Hlutke zeroes in on a pitch during Wawasee’s 22-9 softball win at West Noble Tuesday afternoon. (Photos by Mike Deak)

After posting three runs in the first inning, Wawasee sent 18 batters to the plate in the second inning and ran plated 14 of them. It seemed as though the game wouldn’t have much competition as the Lady Warriors went through its lineup three complete times in the first two innings.

Paige Hlutke, Meghan Fretz and Ale Brito all had RBI hits in the merry-go-round early on. Ironically in the offensive surge with the wind blowing straight out to center at 25 miles per hour, none of Wawasee’s 12 hits in the game went for extra bases.

“We’ve got a lot of girls with offensive power and were hoping to get a lot of balls into the air,” said Wawasee head coach Jared Knipper, who coached at West Noble for eight seasons before taking the Wawasee job. “That second inning we took advantage of a lot of their errors. It was just sloppy softball. It’s not what we coach and not what we want to play. Offensively when we got that kind of lead, I think we got a little complacent.”

Where West Noble killed itself was with the glove, committing 10 errors in its first game of the season. The lack of fundamentals were most glaring in the scoreline for Lady Charger freshman starting pitcher Ashley Strombeck, who did give up 11 hits and four walks in the two innings, but of the 17 runs allowed, only four were earned.

Wawasee starting pitcher Danielle Gunkel picked up the win, allowing just four earned runs.

“I think once we got settled in a little bit, we looked a little more comfortable playing,” said West Noble head coach Christy Gibson. “We definitely were showing first-day jitters.”

Wawasee would run the score to 19-3 after scoring two more unearned runs in the third inning, then West Noble finally awoke. Scoring five runs in the bottom of the third, four of those were also unearned as Wawasee kicked around the ball in the field. The Lady Warriors committed five errors on the night.

Lady Warrior starting pitcher Danielle Gunkel would pick up the win, giving up seven hits and three earned runs while walking two with two strikeouts. Gunkel, however, couldn’t get out of the fourth inning after Kenzie Cox opened the inning with a solid double. Relief pitcher Amber Lemberg closed out the game, not allowing a run and striking out two.

Alexis Graber motors around to score one of Wawasee’s 22 runs against West Noble.

At the plate, Fretz had three hits and drove in four runs while Hlutke and Brito both had three RBIs each. Gunkel would help her cause with three hits and scored three runs. Brito and Cristina DeLaFuente both scored four runs apiece. Maya Mora led West Noble with three hits, two RBIs and two runs scored.

Knipper will take the win, with his team moving to 2-0 on the season after winning Monday night at Lakeland, but knows the sloppy play in the field won’t hold up against more veteran lineups.

“It’s nice to be 2-0 to start the season,” Knipper said heading into Thursday’s home opener against Elkhart Central. “If we play our game, I think we can compete with anybody. We have a lot of talent and a lot of ability. But we can’t play sloppy and let some of the mental blocks catch up to us like they did at times today.”

West Noble (0-1) will get back at it Wednesday night at home against Goshen. Gibson is relishing the chance to see how her club will respond.

“It was really encouraging to see that the whole lineup responded today in different ways,” Gibson said. “We had different girls all step up at times. Strombeck will bounce back. She has great potential. Freshman pitching varsity in the first game, I think the pressure got to her a little trying too hard to locate pitches. She’ll learn from it and you’ll see a different pitcher as the year goes on.”

Wawasee’s JV hosted West Noble Tuesday afternoon and clobbered the Lady Chargers 16-0. Hannah Haines picked up the win for Wawasee (2-0) and was aided by eight runs of support in the first inning. Wawasee scored at least two runs in all four innings.