NORTH MANKATO, Minn. - Inbetween state tournament games Thursday, Cherry softball coach Darrell Bjerklie said he was going to talk to his team about improving its hitting for the evening Class A semifinal against New Ulm Cathedral.
After pitcher Kacey Herring bailed out the Tigers’ anemic hitting performance with a near- perfect game in a 1-0 quarterfinal victory over Browerville, Bjerklie knew they would need to bring the bats against the six-time state-champion Greyhounds.
The talk didn’t help.
New Ulm Cathedral pitcher Anna Mohr kept the Tigers off-balance in a 3-0 victory at Caswell Park, allowing just three hits and striking out nine to send the top-ranked Greyhounds (25-1) into today’s championship game against New Life Academy. Fifth-ranked Cherry (23-5), winners of five consecutive Section 7A titles, will play Edgerton/Southwest Minnesota Christian for third place at 11 a.m. today.
“It’s hard to win with a goose egg on the scoreboard,” Bjerklie said. “Our biggest problem is (the players’) heads were full of junk and they couldn’t clear them. It’s hard to hit when your mind is racing. You just can’t hit with a full head. It’s up to them to control it. We told them to relax, but a full head is a slow bat. They have to fix that for tomorrow.
“We’ll be having batting practice (in the morning).”
Cathedral scored all three runs off Herring in the fourth inning. Abby Hauser led off with a walk, Karlee Pfaff singled her to third base and Anne Schwarz was hit by a pitch to load the bases. McKenna Berdan’s one-out walk pushed the first run across home plate and Anna Mohr followed with an RBI single for a 2-0 lead.
MacKinnon Ehlenz’ squeeze bunt scored Schwarz with the final run.
Mohr, who improved to 18-0 on the season, then kept Cherry hitters guessing at her pitches. She allowed only one runner - Abby Mayry in the fifth - to reach third.
“We had some timely hitting and great pitching, and that was the story of the game,” Cathedral coach Bob Mertz said. “Anna did a nice job of keeping them off-balance with the change-up. Not just throwing a change-up, but throwing a change-up for a strike is important.”
Bjerklie said the opposing pitching wasn’t any different than his team faced much of the season, but translating talent into confidence can be difficult.
“Sometimes players make the game bigger than it is,” he said. “It’s the same game they’ve been playing all year.”
The Tigers have one more chance to finish on a high note.
“Our goal is to win that last game of the year and bring hardware back to the Northland,” Bjerklie said.
CHERRY 1, BROWERVILLE 0
Herring’s bid for perfect game immortality ended one out shy, but Cherry still had the scoreboard’s most important statistic in its favor.
Herring mowed down the first 20 batters, including 14 by strikeout, before hitting Haley Piotrowski with a pitch with two outs in the seventh inning. Only three pitchers have been credited with a perfect game in state tournament history, with just one coming in the last decade.
Third baseman Crystal Pearson followed with a single to end the no-hitter and forced Herring to focus on retiring second baseman Kale Knutson to preserve the win. Herring struck out Knutson on three pitches.
“I felt good about my pitching performance, but batting not so good,” Herring said. “We’d like to get our bats going earlier, but that didn’t happen.”
“Kacey’s performance was the kind of performance we needed to get through this first game,” Bjerklie said.
Cherry (23-4) struggled hitting off Browerville pitcher Makenna Hegseth, who brought a no-hitter into the sixth inning.
“I challenged the seniors,” Bjerklie said. “I said, ‘It’s time to step up and do something this game. You guys are the leaders and are the reason we are down here.’ “
Senior infielder Heidi Olson singled to lead off the sixth, advanced to second on Rayanna Peterson’s single and scored on senior catcher Logan Anderson’s single to give Cherry’s its lone run.
Herring’s one-hitter was the 58th in tournament history and the third by a Cherry hurler, following Sara Sauter in 2011 and Shaina Novak in 2012.
