Pelkey, Sweet Each Homer Twice as Mounties Roll

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. -- The Mount Greylock softball team Tuesday started and ended the game with two-run home runs.

 

In between, Mounties hit five more round-trippers in a 16-3 win over Westfield Tech in the quarter-finals of the Western Massachusetts Class C tournament.

 

A.J. Pelkey got things started with a homer in the bottom of the first to erase a 1-0 Tiger lead.

 

Malia Koffi ended things in the bottom of the sixth when she crushed a ball to left to drive in Vayda Larabee and end the game via the run rule.

 

Pelkey and Kami Sweet each homered twice in the win. Sweet also struck out one and allowed just one earned run to help third-seeded Mount Greylock (13-6) set up a rubber match with Taconic in the regional semi-finals.

 

The second-seeded Thunder advanced on Tuesday with a 6-4 win over Frontier.

 

In the regular season, each team won on its home field. The Mounties won the second meeting in Williamstown on May 4.

 

After Pelkey got the Mounties on the board in the first, Sweet followed with a two-out solo shot to left to make it 3-1.

 

Mount Greylock coach Mark Pierson said Pelkey's second homer of the season and first of the game helped set the tone.

 

"Everybody's relaxed and just starts swinging the bats free," Pierson said. "[WTA's Allyssa Slack] threw hard, but she left a few balls up, and fortunately we were able to hit them.

 

"I guess [Pelkey] was saving it for the playoffs."

 

Westfield Tech coach Victoria Camp said Slack, who pitched the Tigers to a 13-2 record in the regular season, was not rattled by the Mounties' big hits early on.

 

"Honestly, I think that just made her try harder," Camp said. "But [Mount Greylock] has such good hitters. They're really skilled.

 

"She gets frustrated, but it's going to make her throw harder and harder and harder. She'll make it more of a challenge for them. But they were good."

 

Slack settled down and notched two of her eight strikeouts in the next five batters after Sweet's homer. The Tigers allowed the leadoff hitter to reach on an error to start the second, but Slack retired the next three in order to keep it a 3-1 game.

 

Westfield Tech had a chance to cut into the deficit in the top of the third when it got a runner with one out. But the next hitter flew out to right, and the runner was caught straying off first when Mila Marcisz fired to the bag for a double play.

 

In the fourth, back-to-back base-running errors cost the Tigers.

 

A leadoff walk was followed by a single to right, but the lead runner rounded second too far, and Marcisz picked up her second assist of the game by hitting shortstop Emma Newberry, who relayed to Koffi, who applied the tag.

 

WTA then stole second to get a runner in scoring position with one out. But a line drive to Kelsey MacHaffie at first led to another double play when she fired to Newberry at short to double off the runner.

 

"We see this every single year when we're playing a team that is really strong," Camp said. "A lot of times, my players get really nervous. So everything that we practiced all year long ... it's kind of like their heads are spinning. So you've got to get over that."

 

Mount Greylock's offense, meanwhile, picked up a pair of runs in the third without a home run when Pelkey hit a one-out single and scored on Newberry's double and Newberry came home on an RBI single from Marcisz.

 

In the fifth, the Mounties opened a 10-2 lead in a rally that featured a leadoff homer from Pelkey and a two-run shot from Sweet.

 

In the sixth, Newberry led off with a team-leading 10th homer, and Marcisz added a two-run bomb before Koffi hit her ninth round-tripper of the season.

 

Both Koffi and Sweet each had a home run in an 11-9 loss at Taconic back in April. Mount Greylock may need more of the same to get past the Thunder and into the regional final.

 

"I think it's going to really be a challenge for us," Pelkey said. "But if we practice hard the next two days, I think we'll be OK."