Holy Redeemer ends Kutztown’s state title bid in PIAA quarterfinals

ALLENTOWN >> In order reach its goal of winning the PIAA Class AA championship, Kutztown needed to take down Holy Redeemer, the reigning state champs.

The Cougars couldn’t pull off the feat, losing 7-1 to Holy Redeemer in the PIAA Class AA quarterfinals on Thursday at Patriots Park.

“The young girls we have could have very easily folded, knowing they were playing the state champ, but they didn’t,” Kutztown head coach Kevin Conrad said. “They came out and battled … I couldn’t be prouder of the girls.”

The feelings were shared by senior left fielder Maria Meigio.

“We really were calm today,” Meigio said. “We brought the energy, left it all on the field and showed them what we had. It wasn’t enough, but we’re pretty proud about how we played.”

After a slow offensive start in their opening round win against Philadelphia Academy Charter, Kutztown got the bats going in the first inning of Thursday’s game.

Ashley Donat led off with a bunt for a hit. Megan Parks reached on an error and suddenly the Cougars had two runners on with no outs. Courtney Stump flew out to shortstop, but Meigio kept the rally alive with an RBI single to right field to give Kutztown an early 1-0 lead.

With two outs and Meigio and Kylie Balthaser on base, right fielder Jillian Siefert hit a line drive up the middle. Meigio tried to score from second, but the throw home by Royals’ center fielder Tiana Wren just beat her to the plate.

“They made a nice play,” Conrad said. “And I knew we weren’t going to score a lot of runs, so I made the decision to try and score that run, and unfortunately she made the play.“

Wren, who went 4-for-4, scored a run for Holy Redeemer in the second inning to tie the game. Four hits in the third inning helped the Royals push three more runs across and grab a 4-1 lead. They added three more in the sixth inning to put the game out of reach.

Holy Redeemer had 13 hits. Eight of their nine hitters tallied hits. Along with Wren, Morgan Bienkowski, Brittany Hebda and Meghan Armstrong had multi-hit games.

Kutztown freshman pitcher Katie Calkins had pitched 27 consecutive scoreless innings prior to Thursday’s game. She allowed seven runs in five innings of work. The Royals approach to hitting the righthander was patience.

“The biggest thing is seeing pitches,” Holy Redeemer head coach Jerry Paulukonis said. “You can’t go up there and see it’s a strike and just hit it. You have to see a couple of pitches, let her work her zone and pick out the one you can do something with.”

The Cougars answered Holy Redeemer’s offense with eight hits of their own. Meigio went 3-for-3. Donat, Calkins, Stump,

Jordan Dunn and Jillian Siefert also had hits.

Conrad’s team had seven base runners get into scoring position. Kutztown also had base runners in all but two innings.

“We need play good defense, we need to get good pitching, and we need to scratch for a run or two,” Conrad said. “That been our M.O. for the past couple of games. This game here was a little bit different because I think we actually slugged with them a little bit. … I was actually a little impressed with the contact that we did have.”

“We did have some key hits, but we were missing the big hits,” Meigio added.

Kutztown loses four seniors to graduation. Conrad hopes this year’s district title and state playoff run can have an impact on the returnees.

“This was so valuable for them,” Conrad said. “I didn’t see any nerves. I didn’t see any rattling. As a matter of fact, some of our first year players got some key base hits in there. Next year should be nothing surprising to them. This run we had through districts and the state tournament, we’re going to build off of that next year.”