Long Beach tops Calhoun for perfect week

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Playing against each other for the second time in four days and for a fourth straight day overall, Long Beach and Calhoun continued on their respective paths in Nassau Conference AA-I softball on April 21.

Long Beach scored at least one run in every inning while sophomore pitcher Taylor Haines faced just nine batters over the final three frames and yielded only one run over the last five on the way to a 13-7 home victory in blustery conditions. 

“This was a big week for us,” Long Beach coach Carmine Verde said. “Today got us over .500 and added to a confidence level. But by no stretch are we a finished product. We still have a lot of work to do.” 

Junior Elanor Byrne and sophomore Colleen Mannle each scored three runs for the Lady Marines, who won their fourth in a row to improve to 5-4 in AA-I. Sophomore shortstop Paulina Cardona added a two-run single and ignited double plays in the first, third and seventh innings. Sophomores Christine Argentieri and Kayla Pilotti drove in two runs apiece for the Lady Colts, who slipped to 1-9.

“Having such a young team, with six underclassmen starting, playing four days in a row is rough,” Calhoun coach Jason Boland said. “It was a big reason why we had such a difficult game defensively. 

“Nothing comes easy in Conference I, but we like playing the top competition” he added. “I think we still can be a tough team to face come playoff time.”

After the teams played six innings of scoreless ball in Long Beach’s 5-1 victory on April 18, they combined for 10 runs in the first two innings of the rematch. The Lady Colts scored twice in the first and then pushed across four runs in the second on consecutive hits by eighth-grade pitcher Lindsay Roman, sophomore Jennifer Imhof, senior Nicole Imhof and Pilotti. 

“Taylor really settled in and got into a rhythm,” Verde said of Haines, who earlier in the week worked 10 solid innings in a win over Syosset. “She wasn’t herself in the first inning and the defense didn’t help her in the early going,” he added. “To her credit, she stayed composed and threw a really strong game.”

The Lady Marines took a 7-6 lead after three innings. Sophomore Meredith Fagan had a run-scoring single, junior Amanda Angst plated Mannle on a safety squeeze, and Fagan scored on an error.

After Calhoun tied it in the top of the fourth on Pilotti’s single, Fagan had another RBI in the bottom of the inning when the Lady Marines scored twice for a 9-7 lead. Junior Tonianne Larson, who struck out 11 batters in the first meeting to earn the win, drove in a run in the fifth, and Angst’s RBI highlighted a three-run fifth.

“We’re in much better shape than we were last Saturday leaving East Meadow after losing the suspended game and the regularly scheduled game,” Verde explained. “We only lost 2-0 and 3-1, and most were unearned runs.”