Long Beach focused on defense

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As was the case early last spring, defensive woes are plaguing Long Beach on the softball field.

The offense has bailed the Lady Marines out in their two wins, scoring 11 against Oceanside and 19 against Plainview, however, longtime coach Carmine Verde knows the defense will need to improve like it did in 2017 when they reached the Class AA championship series.

“We’re playing poor defense, that’s the biggest issue,” he said after last Saturday’s 8-3 loss at Port Washington. “The girls would be the first ones to admit we haven’t played up to our capabilities.

“We had the same issue last year and we turned it around,” Verde added. “We’ve been down this road and they’ve got the right attitude. We’re relying on young pitchers and we’re not helping them out.”

Senior Taylor Haines was expected to handle much of the workload in the circle following the graduation of All-State pitcher Tonianne Larson. However, an injury kept Haines from throwing at all this spring and thrust sophomore Jillian Domingo, freshman Erica D’Aria and eighth-grader Alex Hastings into the most important role on the field.

Domingo, Verde said, is doing the heaviest lifting and a solid job. She’s had some outings with over 120 pitches, however, and the plan is to lighten her responsibilities this week. She pitched the last four innings to earn the win April 10 when Long Beach held on for a 19-15 victory at Plainview after scoring 10 runs in the top of the first.

D’Aria got the win in relief against Oceanside April 5 when the Lady Marines (2-5) scored three runs in their final-at bat thanks to five consecutive singles.

“Last year with Tonianne we were getting 10 to 12 strikeouts per game,” Verde said. “We’ve got young arms this year and we’re getting 4 or 5 strikeouts, so that’s 16-17 plays you need to make it the field. It hasn’t been fun playing in freezing cold weather, but we need to be better defensively there’s no way around it.”

The offense has been a little up and down, Verde noted, but totaled double digits in runs in both victories.

Sophomore shortstop Katie Frisch had quite a day against Plainview, going 5-for-5 with a homer, two doubles, a single, a walk, four RBIs and four runs scored out of the leadoff spot. She and No. 2 hitter Colleen Mannle scored twice in the first inning.

Senior Meredith Fagan had three hits and three RBIs, Domingo scored three runs, and junior Nicole Grandinetti had two hits and drove in a pair. Long Beach led 13-4 heading into the bottom of the fourth before Plainview rallied with six runs. “It was one of the highest-scoring games we’ve played in a long time,” Verde said.

The Lady Marines were down to their final out and had no runners on base when Domingo, Frisch, Mannle, senior Paulina Cardona and freshman Lainie Kassap all came through with hits to stun Oceanside, 11-10. Cardona drove in Domingo and Frisch to tie it, and Kassap’s single to right scored Mannle with the winning run.