Late rally propels Hodags past Antigo

The Rhinelander High School softball team remained unbeaten in Great Northern Conference play Thursday, April 9, scoring five runs in the seventh inning, including a walkoff home run by junior Ava Rathbun, to defeat Antigo 9-7 in the Hodag Dome.

The Hodags were unable to carry that momentum into a weekend tournament in Mauston, however, dropping three straight non-conference matchups April 10 and 11. The Hodags fell to Clintonville 7-4, were blanked by Whitnall 6-0 and gave up a late rally in an 11-7 loss to Lake Mills.

Rhinelander 9, Antigo 7

    Rhinelander’s Ruby Plamann hits a game-tying double during the seventh inning of a GNC softball game against Antigo in the Hodag Dome Thursday, April 9. (Bob Mainhardt for the River News)
  

Rhinelander came from down 7-2 to score seven unanswered runs in the last three innings of a conference game against Antigo. 

Maddie Paulson was 2-for-3 on the night, scoring in the fifth before being the first run to start the Hodags’ rally in the seventh. Ruby Plamann tied the game with a double that scored Nevaeh Anderson, who ran in Saige Mutter’s place, and Kalyn Miller. 

With Plamann still on the base paths, and Gracie Glatz now pitching for the Red Robins, Ava Rathbun fell down in the count 1-2, fighting off her last strike to stay alive in the at bat. Rathbun took the next pitch and sent it over the fence in left to walk it off for the Hodags, 9-7. 

“That was all of us. All the hits, all the outs, all the plays that led to that home run that was not just me,” Rathbun said. 

“I just think winning and putting these games and stringing these games together, where we are down in most of these games and we’re coming back to win, is just tremendous for these girls’ confidence,” added coach Ali Bender.

The Hodags started strong, holding a 1-0 lead after the first. The Red Robins answered with six runs in the top of the second, including back-to-back home runs from leadoff batter Emma Beck and No. 2 hitter Jewel Weix. After the Red Robins batted around the order, the Hodags were able to stop Antigo’s momentum and answer with one run in the bottom of the second. 

Bender spent a mound visit telling her team to stay composed during Antigo’s big inning. 

“The biggest message was things like that are going to happen, and you’re going to get slapped in the face sometimes by some adversity. And we just knew how to power through,” she said. 

Antigo added another run in the third before going scoreless for the rest of the game.

Aleece Johnson threw all seven inning, giving up nine hits and seven runs, striking out five and walking one.  

Clintonville 7, Rhinelander 4

It took four innings to start the scoring in Friday’s first game. Clintonville jumped to a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the fourth after two costly Hodag errors. 

Rhinelander answered quickly in the top of the fifth with a pair of their own. Singles came from Cassidy Linder, Johnson, and Chase Verbist, with Verbist’s hit scoring both Linder and Johnson. 

Clintonville responded with five runs in the bottom of the fifth, Marley Tauferner contributing with two RBIs on her single to left field, two more runs coming when Maddy LaViolette advanced to third. The Hodags put a stop to the scoring with a double play — Kalyn Miller to Kadyn Taylor. 

The Hodags’ battled back with another two runs in the top of the sixth to make it 7-4, but came up short after going scoreless for the remainer of the contest. 

One big inning for Clintonville proved to be killer for Rhinelander. Bender said the team looks to clean up the small errors that contributed to that inning moving forward. Struggling to hit out of the gate and not scoring runs until the latter half of the game proved poisonous to Rhinelander as well. 

“(We) all agreed on after the game that that’s a game we’d love to have back,” she said. “Love to play again, face them again because we feel that we made some errors, some mental errors, and physical errors that played a role into the score of the game. And if we clean those things up, which we will ... that’s a very winnable game.”

Johnson took the circle again, striking out five while walking two. Five earned runs came from five Clintonville hits. 

Whitnall 6, Rhinelander 0

Rhinelander was shutout for the first time this season by the Whitnall Falcons and pitcher Reese Johnsen. She gave up only two hits with no walks, and struck out 11 of the 23 Hodags she faced. 

It was a pretty slow night behind the Hodags’ sticks, but Bender spoke on the significance of getting outside again and benefiting from that experience. 

“It was nice to actually be out and be able to read a ball off a bat that’s a pop fly in the air that’s not either going to hit the roof in the dome, or just to, like, having the different wind and the different dynamics of the game. This is how softball is supposed to be played outside and so it’s really nice to be outside.” 

With Kendall Vanney out of the lineup with an injury, Johnson stayed consistent as Rhinelander’s main arm in the circle. 

“She has done fantastic,” Bender said. “I keep saying to our pitching coach, the more she pitches, the more innings she pitches, the better she gets.” 

Since Thursday against Antigo, Johnson has thrown nearly 400 pitches. Bender highlighted Johnson’s accuracy in the circle as well. Whitnall hitters saw 67 pitches from Johnson, 47 of them being strikes. 

“She had big key strikeouts when we needed them,” Bender said of her main arm. “I am just so proud of how well she’s done and she’s not getting down when we’re not making the plays, which is very helpful.”

Lake Mills 11, Rhinelander 7

Rhinelander was in a dogfight during the last game of its weekend road trip in Mauston. The Hodags went back and fourth with the L-Cats, with Lake Mills eventually pulling away in the top of the seventh inning on a grand slam from Lily Doerr. Scoring began early and remained consistent throughout seven innings.  

The Hodags replied with a run in the bottom of the second after the L-Cats quickly got out front 2-0 in the first. Miller was walked, and scored the Hodags’ opening run when Linder reached on a 2-out error. Lake Mills tallied one more the next inning, bumping their lead back to two. 

A four-run fourth gave Rhinelander its first lead of the game, courtesy of Mutter, who was 1-for-3 on the day when she lined a triple to score Audrina Skubal and Paulson, making it 5-3 in favor of the Hodags. 

Rathbun hit an RBI double in the fifth that scored Plamann, and the Hodags’ seventh run came in the sixth when Skubal scored her second run of the contest. The L-Cats responded in the fifth and the sixth, making it a one-run game headed into the final inning. 

Knotted at seven runs apiece in the top of the seventh, Lake Mills reached and eventually scored on an error, before loading the bases with a score of 7-7. Rhinelander was unable to answer after Doerr cranked out the grand slam. 

“We always preach that the first out is the most important one. We have to get that first out. And we had an error when a ball got hit to left field,” Bender said. 

Bender said she will look to tweak a few things in the limited practices the Hodags will have coming up, including speeding things up and improving the teams situational awareness in different game scenarios.  

“I think we’re just going to put them in more pressure situations in practice. That puts a little pressure on them. If I can speed up practice and I can speed up the drills we’re doing, then the game’s going to slow down, which is also going to help the girls. And it’s nothing that we haven’t done before. We just need that time to go back and refresh.” 

Bender said she was happy with how her team was able to correct errors on the fly. Each one that happened only happened once and was never repeated, so the team was able to learn. 

Pitching for the Hodags again came from Johnson, whose seven innings resulted in 16 hits, three strikeouts, one walk, and two earned runs. 

“If we can play defense and we can back our great pitching we’ve had, there’s no doubt that we’ll be winning the games,” Bender said.

The Hodags (6-4, 2-0 Great Northern) looked to rebound with GNC action Monday against Northland Pines. That game was originally scheduled for this afternong, but was moved, with the Hodag Dome unavailable Tuesday due to the Hodag Hybrid track meet. Rhinelander's outdoor fields are not expected to be ready for play by today.

The Hodags will head to conference newcomer Merrill on Thursday. 

Blake Richard may be reached via email at [email protected].