Exeter upsets Warwick in Districts

Exeter base runner Zoe Texidor beats a throw to Warwick catcher Jolyssa High at the plate while helping the Lady Eagles take an early 3-0 lead on Tuesday night. (Photo by Preston Whitcraft)

Take away the first inning and Warwick’s District Three Quad-A first-round softball game against Exeter Township might have been a different story.

Unfortunately for Warwick, that opening frame counted, as the Lady Eagles scored three runs while capitalizing on less-than-crisp WHS defense.

From there, Exeter pitcher Sarah Musselman made the lead stand up and the 16th-seeded Lady Eagles upset top-seeded Warwick 3-2 in Lititz.

With that, a magical season in which the Warwick girls (20-3) won the Section One crown and had hopes for a long post-season run came to an end.

“It ended too early and that’s what I’m heartbroken about for the kids,” Warwick coach Mark Hough remarked.

Warwick managed just five hits through the first six innings off of Musselman and found themselves trailing 3-1 entering its final at-bats. But they had one final gasp left in them.

Jo High, who went 3-for-3, led off with a single to right field, then Kaitlyn Seibert had a one-out bunt single, and both runners moved into scoring position on an errant throw by Exeter third baseman Sydney Manwiller.

With two outs, Warwick leadoff batter Mackenzie Russell (2-for-3, BB) singled over shortstop into shallow left-center, driving in courtesy runner Jenny Woolley. But Seibert was stopped at third.

“It was too short of a shot,” Hough recalled. “I thought (Kaitlyn) kinda got held up a little bit by the shortstop, she was a little bit obstructed, so I didn’t feel like she was getting to third as quick. Obviously, (the throw) came in high. But I felt Vanessa (Strohm) was hitting the ball pretty hard and you’d hate getting a run thrown out at the plate when you’ve got first and third and a senior coming up that’s been hitting.”

Strohm, who earlier hit a couple of balls hard, but right at Exeter’s defense, worked Musselman to a 2-2 count, but then went down swinging to end it.

“I still trust my judgment in Vanessa,” Hough remarked. “My heart aches for her right now because I think it’s killing her.”

The win sends Exeter (14-7) to Thursday’s quarterfinals to face the winner between 8th-seeded Mechanicsburg (16-4) and No. 9 Penn Manor (12-6).

“(Musselman) is a good pitcher,” Hough said, “and I think she’s going to give a lot of people some challenges in the next round. I wish them a lot of luck because they beat us and you hope they go a little bit further so it takes the sting out of it.”

The Lady Eagles didn’t sting the ball off of WHS pitcher Amanda Herr in the top of the first, but they still got favorable results. Leading off, Musselman helped her cause by reaching second on a throwing error and then Zoe Texidor beat out an infield single up the middle, one of seven in the game for Exeter.

One out later, Halle Kisamore plated Musselman with the game’s first run. Manwiller then hit a sac fly and Coryn Umg’s swinging bunt drove in Kisamore to give the Lady Eagles a quick 3-0 lead.

“Amanda pitched a game good enough to win,” Hough said. “We came back and had our chances there in the seventh, but at this level &tstr; I don’t care if you’re the 16th seed, the 32nd seed. If you give somebody three errors in the first inning, it’s going to be hard to come back and win a game like that.”

“We hit some at-em balls today and we just kinda shot ourselves in the foot in the first inning,” he added. “We played the game an inning too late. That’s really what we did.”

Herr, who K’d nine, walked none and scattered 11 hits, ended up throwing 29 of her 101 pitches in the first inning against Exeter.

Musselman, meanwhile, retired six of the first seven Warwick batters she faced. The Lady Warriors put two runners on base in the third inning on Seibert’s (2-for-3) bunt single and Russell’s walk, but they were stranded. The Lady Eagles’ hurler, who has a no-hitter against Governor Mifflin and a four-hitter vs. Wilson to her credit this season, whiffed six, walked just one and gave up eight hits.

Finally in the fourth, the Lady Warriors broke through. Ashley Royer ripped a hard-hit double to left and scored when High belted a 3-2 pitch from Musselman to right for an RBI single.

They also had a runner at second with two outs in fifth, thanks to Russell blooping a single to left and advancing to second on an error.

But Exeter managed to carry a 3-1 lead into the bottom of the seventh. There, despite a spirited comeback effort from Warwick, it was too little, too late.

“Earlier in the year,” Hough said, “we talked about hits being contagious and we’d get a hit and then everybody else kinda followed suit. Tonight, it just wasn’t there. I feel bad for the seniors because they deserve better than this. But the other team capitalized on mistakes and won the game.”

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