Hodag softball drops regular season finale to Mosinee

The Rhinelander High School softball team couldn’t keep up with Great Northern Conference champion Mosinee on Tuesday night, but saw some glimmers that they hope could propel them to a playoff rematch with the top-seeded Indians.

Mosinee scored 10 times in the first inning and rolled to a 16-0 victory at Andrea Musson Field. 

Mosinee (18-6, 11-1 Great Northern) did most of its damage with a combination of hits and walks, but the Hodags (5-15, 2-10) held the top-scoring offense in GNC history to only two runs through innings two through four, to ensure the game got to five innings before the run-rule was applied. 

“Really, it wasn’t a slow start, I mean, there’s nothing we can do about those hits,” Hodag coach Ali Bender. said. “They rallied multiple hits together, and we got the ball in. So I’m happy with that. I mean, when you face a good hitting team, you can expect things like that. 

“I’m not upset with the score or the outcome of this game, because if we cut out that first inning, it’s a comparable ball game.”

The first eight Mosinee batters reached safely via a combination of four hits and four walks. Paetyn Jirschele added a two-run triple her second time up in the inning and Maggie Wolter added a two-run single that made it 10-0. 

Taelyn Jirschele hit an RBI single in the second inning, but the Hodags relayed the ball in from the outfield to cut down Brooklyn Simonis’s attempt to reach third on the play, ending the inning. Megan Treu added an RBI single in the third before the Hodags held Mosinee scoreless in the fourth. 

“Innings two through five, I mean, we were solid,” Bender said. “We made the plays, Cass (Lindner) did a great job at shortstop. Kalyn (Miller) kept getting the ball in. We hit the cut. We’ve been practicing the angles that we take.”

Mosinee tacked on four runs in the fifth. Addyson Henrich led off with a solo home run to left center, Emily Verhasselt hit a two-run double and Peyton Allen added an RBI groundout. 

Kendall Vanney started and took the loss for Rhinelander, allowing 10 runs on nine hits with a pair of strikeouts over two stints in the circle, totaling three innings. Fellow freshman Aleece Johnson relieved Vanney in the first inning and went two innings, giving up six runs on four hits with a pair of strikeouts. 

    Rhinelander’s Aleece Johnson pitches during the first inning of a GNC softball game against Mosinee at Andrea Musson Field Tuesday, May 20. Johnson worked two innings in her first pitching appearance since May 6. (Jeremy Mayo/River News)
  

It marked Johnson’s first pitching appearance since an May 6 doubleheader at Antigo as the freshman has dealt with elbow soreness. 

“We’re just testing the limits right now with her arm day by day, you know, watching the swelling,” Bender said. “She’s still got another three years, so we are not going to ruin that. Again, both pitchers did a great job tonight.”

Ava Busse struck out nine for Mosinee over five innings in the win. Sadie Edyvean drew a leadoff walk in the third to give the Hodags their first base runner of the game and Vanney broke up Busse’s no-hit bid with a one-out single in the fourth. 

Bender said the Hodags did a better job of putting the ball in play against Busse than the teams’ first meeting in Mosinee.

“We’ve been cranking the pitching machine up. Our new pitching machine throws drops, curves, rises. We’ve been throwing everything at them the last few days and we’re going to continue that because there’s a chance that if we beat Waupaca, we go to Mosinee next Tuesday. So hopefully we can see them again,” she said.

Rhinelander drew the No. 9 seed for the WIAA tournament during this past Sunday’s regional seeding meeting and traveled to eighth-seeded Waupaca Thursday in a regional quarterfinal game that concluded after press time for today’s edition. It’s a rematch of a May 10 meeting at the Shawano Invite that Waupaca won 7-2. The winner of the game will face top-seeded Mosinee in the regional semifinals this coming Tuesday.

“I think that’s an awesome matchup for us,” Bender said of the first-round draw against Waupaca. “It’s definitely a matchup that is very beatable. We can play right with them. I think it’s going to be a close game. We’ve got to make the plays and we’ve got to put the bat on the ball. And if we do those two things, we’re going to be just fine.”

Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].