MSS-Ping-Ping

Noah Graves

Metallic “pings” filled the sky as the Dalat men’s softball team, led by Coach Edman and Coach Sasse, and the girls’ team, led by Coach Grad and Coach Pam Hoffmeyer, hit ball after ball at the MSSPP softball tournament from Tuesday, May 2^nd to Monday, May 8^th. Both teams filled the stat sheets with home runs.

The boys’ team steamrolled their first six opponents and cruised to the semifinals, the cumulative score of the first six games being 94-5. The girls’ team also made it to the semifinals, winning three games with a cumulative score of 34-7

Both teams were led by a strong core of seniors who ignited the contagious scoring.

The boys had a difficult semifinals matchup, facing the defending champs and the team who beat them in the finals last year: Jit Sin. They went into the semifinals swinging the bat ambitiously, but they met their match when the faced Jit Sin’s flamethrowing starting pitcher. Jit Sin jumped out to a quick 4-0 lead with good hits and some careless fielding errors by the Eagles. The Eagles were able to put one run on the board but Jit Sin came back with three more of their own, extending the lead to 7-1. The score would not change for the remainder of the game, and Dalat was knocked out of MSSPP.

The Eagles had their chances to win the game: they left the bases loaded with one out in one inning and had two runners on base with one out in the following inning, but they came up with nothing both times. The boys also had their fair share of fielding errors, giving Jit Sin three of their seven runs. The team, being mostly seniors, left disappointed in themselves. They looked even better this year than they did last year and were hoping to make another run at gold. Though the outcome was not desired, the boys had a blast up until the semifinals. They were slugging in the first six games and they had the times of their lives.

However, because of their early offensive success, they finished with a bronze medal because of the runs scored differential. Next year looks like it will be a rebuilding season for the men’s softball team because of how many seniors they are losing, but maybe they will be able to make another run at gold in a couple of years.

The girls also lost their semifinal final game against SMK Permatang Tok Labu (SMKPTL), who won 7-4. But Felicia Teoh (12) pitched a strong game to end her career. And for the tournament, Esther Kim (10) was the one who boasted a homerun.

For both teams, it was great way to end the season and a fun way for the seniors to go out.