Tough stretch for Lady Falcons

Crossover games against the cream of the crop of Nassau Class ABC softball has Valley Stream South mired in a skid that reached five games last Monday with a heartbreaking 7-4 home loss to Sewanhaka.

The Lady Falcons allowed four runs in the top of the seventh—all with two outs. A dropped pop-up opened the door for Michelle Mongiello’s bases-loaded triple that eventually won it for Sewanhaka, which snapped an eight-game losing streak. Rachel Wisniewski singled home Mongiello for the final margin.

“I can think of seven things that could’ve gone differently for us to win this game,” VSS coach Dom Fontana said. “We’re not getting any breaks. We hit the ball hard all day, but right at the defense.”

Trailing 3-0, South (3-5 in Conference ABC-II) pushed across two runs in the second, one in the fourth and one in the sixth to take the lead. Sophomore Angela Aragona hit a two-run single off the shortstop’s glove to get the offense off the ground. Senior Samantha Howley doubled home senior Tricia Zarro to tie it in the fourth, and sophomore Jessica Liberato drew a walk from relief pitcher Monique Roberge to make it 4-3 in the sixth.

The Lady Falcons almost broke the game open after Liberato’s walk, but sophomore Christie DeMarco’s line drive shot to right field was caught, with no runners able to advance, and Roberge got a strikeout to retire the side. “We left a ton of runners on base,” Fontana said. “If the ball DeMarco hit was a couple of feet to either side of the right fielder, it’s at least three runs.”

Three of South’s previous four losses were by one run. It lost 1-0 to Clarke and Seaford, and fell 3-2 at Oyster Bay. “Four of the five losses we’ve had came down to the last batter,” Fontana said. “Even though we’re playing top teams, we still need to find a way to scratch across a run or two. We have to get the leadoff batter on base more often to start an inning and go from there.”

Sophomore pitcher Ashley Tkacsik, an All-County selection in 2009 along with her battery mate, DeMarco, is keeping the Lady Falcons in every game and also leading them at the plate with a .333 average. “Ashley’s extremely accurate and knows how to battle out of jams,” Fontana said of Tkacsik, who has 45 strikeouts and just eight walks. “Generally, we’ve played solid defense behind her. But it seems like every mistake we’ve made during this nightmare has come back to haunt us.”

South opened the conference slate with wins over Island Trees, Division and Bethpage. Sophomore Danielle Bowker drove in the winning runs against Island Trees and Bethpage, and Liberato did so against Division.

“It’s going to be interesting to see how we respond,” Fontana said. “We’re desperate to get back in the win column.”

A visit from Carle Place on Friday at 4:30 p.m. concludes a six-pack of games against Conference ABC-I.