Warriors return to WPIAL championship

Carlee Soukup and Addy Nigut combined for 5 RBIs as EF scored five runs in its final two at-bats.

LIAM BELAN lbelan@yourmvi.com

After a one-year hiatus from the WPIAL championship, Elizabeth Forward knocked off Chartiers Valley 7-2 to book a ticket back to Lilley Field in the Class 4A title game.

“It’s nice to be back,” Elizabeth Forward head coach Harry Rutherford said. “It was a great game. They did a nice job; it went back and forth there for a little, but we were able to break it open.”

The Warriors (19-1) broke the game open in the fifth and sixth frames, plating five of their seven runs after the Colts (16-4) had tied things up at two.

Shelby Telegdy earned the win on the mound, but she was only able to go six innings after she suffered cramping issues on her throwing hand in the top of the seventh. Thankfully for Elizabeth Forward, Rutherford said that she should be ready to go next week in the championship game against No. 2 Hampton.

“We were a little concerned about Shelby, but it looks like it’s just a cramp in the hand,” he said. “She’s not drinking enough water, so we’ll take care of that. We have a week off, so she’ll be good.”

The Seton Hill softball commit allowed four hits and two runs while striking out 10 in six strong innings.

Julia Johnson took the mound for Telegdy after two pitches in the top of the seventh, putting the Colts down in 1-2-3 fashion to seal her squad’s win.

Offensively, Carlee Soukup and Addyson Nigut did the heavy lifting for the Warriors. Soukup put up three RBIs while Nigut went 3 for 3 with two more RBIs. Telegdy and Aubri Cimba had two hits each as well.

For Chartiers Valley, Taylor Walsh was charged with the loss after allowing 10 hits and seven runs in six innings of work. She struck out two and walked four.

Lily Duffill has been the talk of Chartiers Valley’s offense, and she showed up in a big way, blasting a two-run home run and joining Marta Gualazzi as the only other Colt to muster a hit. Gualazzi also had two hits on the day.

After Telegdy struck out the first two batters of the game, Marta Gualazzi drew a walk and Lily Duffill singled to put two runners on, but a pop out stranded two and put the Warriors at the plate.

Telegdy was eager to impact the game offensively as well, picking up a one-out double to put a runner in scoring position. That brought Soukup to the plate, who mashed an RBI single and reached second on the throw home.

With the score quickly 1-0, Nigut stepped up and brought Soukup right home with a one-run double. The inning ended when Julia Johnson drove a ball about 190 feet to center field, landing in front of the 200-ft fence and in the glove of center fielder Delaney O’Connor.

Telegdy racked up two more strikeouts in the second as a scoreless frame kept the score at 2-0 in favor of Elizabeth Forward. Then, she put up three more in a 1-2-3 third frame for the Colts as EF’s ace fanned seven through three innings of work.

Telegdy opened the bottom of the third by drawing a walk, but the Colts kept the Warriors off the board with an inning-ending double play.

Then, Duffill flipped the game on its head with a long ball to right center to tie things at 2-2. The sophomore’s 14th home run of the season scored Gualazzi as well.

The Warriors promptly got out of the top half of the frame, but they now had some work to do offensively. After two outs, Cimba stepped up and hit a double, but Hannah Evans’s drive to right center found the glove of right fielder Autumn Weitzel to retire the side.

Chartiers Valley looked to take its first lead of the contest in the fifth, as it looked like Duffill would come back to the plate with runners on the corners, but right fielder Maddisyn Best made sure that didn’t happen with an outstanding throw.

With two outs and Walsh trying to reach third base on a single from Gualazzi, Best corralled a ball that deflected off of Berlyn Holibaugh at second and unleashed a laser to third base that allowed Nigut to apply the tag in time.

“It shut down all of their momentum,” Rutherford said about Best’s throw. “They had their best hitter coming up in Duffill, so having her thrown out at third was huge.”

After that huge defensive play, the Colts weren’t able to match it in the bottom of the fifth as a few mishaps allowed the Warriors to retake an advantage.

Julia Resnik led the home half off with a single before two errors from Chartiers Valley allowed her to reach third and Telegdy’s courtesy runner, Samantha Malek, to reach second with no outs.

With Soukup at the plate, she hit a hard ball to short but reached first on another error, allowing Resnik to score and give EF a 3-2 lead.

That brought Nigut to the plate, who drew a walk to load the bases, before Holibaugh grounded into a fielder’s choice at home plate for the first out of the inning. Johnson got the next chance with the bases juiced, and her groundout allowed Soukup to score and make it 4-2. Walsh then sat down Alivia Grimm to complete a solid job of damage control given that the Warriors had bases loaded with no outs. Still, the Colts now trailed heading into the sixth stanza.

And, they were still facing Telegdy.

She mowed through Chartiers Valley in just 11 pitches with two pop outs and a strikeout to give the Colts three more outs before the end of their WPIAL playoff run.

Elizabeth Forward gave Telegdy plenty of insurance in its final appearance at the plate, scoring three runs in the bottom of the sixth.

Cimba, Resnik and Malek scored as three Warriors put up hits in the frame, making it 7-2 in favor of EF.

There was cause for concern after Telegdy had to come out of the game, but Johnson picked up right where she left off and used her curveball to make easy work of Chartiers Valley to end the game.

Elizabeth Forward will look to flip its fate from the 2022 district championship, when it lost 6-0 to Beaver Area.