Local softball player and teammates represent Montana well at Nationals James and teammates represent Montana well at Nationals

By John Heglie / For the Leader

With the completion of the ASA U18 Girls A Western Nationals fastpitch softball tournament played in Seattle this past weekend, the season for organized local involvement in softball essentially comes to a close. The only exception that might be found will likely be the many participants and fans that range throughout the county who will be glued to their TV sets as they watch to see if Women's Softball Team USA (some of whom were featured in last week's Leader) can bring home a gold medal from the Olympics in Beijing.

Lady Pirate/Big Sky Blast shortstop Amanda James was the last representative from the Mission Valley to still be involved in contention at this late stage of the season. The team she plays with during the summer fared very well at the nationals, finishing 4-2 in bracket play. Part of that success has to be credited to Amanda, who not only played great defensively all weekend, but also hit well Friday and Saturday.

The Big Sky Blast, the sole entry representing the state of Montana this year, split pool play 1-1 on Thursday morning, blanking the Colorado (Littleton) Renegades 4-0, but succumbing 6-4 to the Cabrillo Crushers out of Capitola (near Santa Cruz), California. Pool competition essentially serves both as warm up engagements leading up to bracket contention as well as a guide for seeding. In bracket play, the team opened with a narrow 4-3 extra innings loss to the River City Sox out of Rocklin (near Sacramento), California, dropping them into the consolation bracket. The game was scoreless after seven innings, which instituted the international tie breaker rule to break the deadlock, where a runner is placed in scoring position on second base. "Seven runs is a lot for an international tie breaker. Unfortunately, they scored four of those," commented Rick Haegele, head coach of the Big Sky Blast and father of center fielder Heather Haegele. "It took a while to get in the groove." Once they did, the team looked formidable. The Blast then reeled off four successive wins. On Friday, they shut out two teams, blanking both the Seattle Avalance 7-0 and the Washington (Tacoma) Phoenix 10-0. Their final game of Friday evening saw the Blast extract their revenge for an earlier pool play loss against the Cabrillo Crushers, beating them 4-1 this time around. On Saturday, the Blast then proceeded to trounce the Oregon Tigers 13-1, a rout in which local Amanda James laced one double, stroked another hit in which she ended up on second base, as well as generated an RBI.The subsequent game, the Blast were unfortunately eliminated from contention by a heartbreaking extra-innings 3-2 loss to the Riptide out of Newport Beach, California. Rose Harrington hit an RBI triple and the Blast were able to place other runners in scoring position, but unable to get any of the rest of them home. Polsonite Amanda James was walked three times during the course of that contest, some of those deliberately to avoid the risk that she victimize their Riptide pitcher like she had twice in the preceding engagement against the Tigers. With the score knotted 1-1 at the end of the seventh inning, the international tie breaker system again went into effect. Both teams got out of the eighth unscathed. In the top of the ninth, the Riptide were able to score twice, whereas the Blast were only able to bring Amanda James home from second for a single run in the bottom of the inning. Still, an impressive outing for a Montana team against the likes of the level of talent from around the western portion of the country. The team finished tied for 9th overall from among a field of 42 entries.

Coach Haegele was quite please with the overall level of play from all of his players. In reference to our local senior-to-be Lady Pirate, he was equally complimentary. "The tournament featured some of the best shortstops from around the country," observed the coach, "and Amanda would have to be considered one of those." Northwestern A conference and non-conference opponents alike would be inclined to concur. But Amanda herself would be reticent to accept much of the credit for their success this season. Her emphasis was that "we played really well as a team," preferring to direct the focus upon their camaraderie, team chemistry and group dynamics. That combination tends to be a formula for success, whether it be in sport or in society at large. Softball fans, at least those from the Polson area, look forward to watching Amanda ply some of the skills she has honed over the course of the summer as the Lady Pirates vie for contention in the conference and a berth in the state tournament to be played in Polson this forthcoming Spring.