By:Sean Moylan
Like golf’s Tiger Woods, sometimes the Bordentown West Jersey Witches 10-and-under softball team is playing in its own tournament while everyone else is playing in their’s.
That was the case when Bordentown squashed the competition in the Lee McKeever Cinnaminson Tournament on June 10-11. The Witches won all four of their games to easily take the title. And in this past weekend’s Mercer County tournament, Bordentown captured three wins without a loss to grab the title. With the win at Mercer, Bordentown has been victorious in six out of the seven tournaments it has entered this season. Wow!
The Witches were especially overpowering in the Cinnaminson tournament — averaging 11.5 runs a game while surrendering only 1.5 runs a contest. Pitted against the Hamilton Hurricanes in the finals, Bordentown mound ace, Melissa Mehrer had the Hurricanes “swinging in the breeze” on her way to a 13-1 win. Mehrer was also credited with a 10-0 shutout over the Hurricanes in the semifinal contest.
Hilary Allen got things started off on the right foot with an 11-3 triumph in the opener.
Then Kara Lynch came back in the second game to blank the Pal-Riv Thunder team 6-0. Melissa Mehrer picked up two wins and 14 ks for the tourney, Hilary Allen had 13 strikeouts and a win, and Kara Lynch recorded a “w” and k’d 4, while keeping the opposition off the board.
Bordentown also returned to its old slugging ways in the Cinnaminson tournament.
Amy DeLuca, who had been sidelined in the Witches’ previous tourney, made up for lost time with a great offensive showing (.727 batting average, 1.455 slugging percentage, eight hits, 13 RBI and a .750 on base average).
“She’s (DeLuca) back with a vengeance,” said Bordentown assistant coach Jack McDonald.
The Witches’ leadoff hitter, Jessica Molnar, did what every coach asks his or her leadoff hitter to do — she got on base. Molnar batted .667 with six walks and seven runs and she reached base nine out of every 10 plate appearances.
Melissa Mehrer was her usual great self with the bat. She batted .714, knocked in eight runs, scored eight times and had a slugging average of 1.143. She also reached base 82 percent of the time she was up.
Meagan Walton (.625 batting average and a 1.25 slugging percentage) Jessica Swanson .600, a 1.00 slugging percentage and Meghan McDonald (.500 and 1.250 slugging percentage) also had huge tournaments.
Courtney Trost launched two homers in her four trips to the plate and drove in five runs. Now that’s production! Sara Kempisty also hit .500 for Bordentown. Amazingly, Bordentown had a team average of .417 and drew a staggering 33 walks in the four games.
In this past weekend’s Mercer County tournament, Bordentown downed Hamilton 5-1 in the final game to take the round-robin event.
While Bordentown’s hitting was phenomenal in both tournaments, it might have to return its great pitching great defense formula to take the NSA tournament this weekend, June 24 and 25. It’s an A level tourney and there are no slouches in it.
“The competition is going to be tough,” noted coach McDonald.
Nevertheless, the Bordentown West Jersey Witches love playing the best because they are the best.
Bordentown ended its regular season with a 5-1 record.
