HS softball: Fitch picking up where it left off

If there’s one thing that set apart Fitch from the rest of the Class LL softball world a year ago, it was their ability to hit.
Just ask Rachele Fico.
The Masuk High graduate dominated just about everyone in her four-year tenure at the Monroe-based school, with the exception of the Falcons who beat Masuk in the LL final last June.
The faces have changed, but the story remains the same, the Falcons still can hit the ball.
Just ask NFA coach Bryan Burdick after his team fell to the Falcons on Friday, 5-3, in Groton.
“Three runs against this team is not enough, they hit,” Burdick said after his team had seen a three-run advantage disappear in the sixth inning. “We did a good job of keeping Brianna Turgeon (two singles) contained, she absolutely mashed the ball against us last time, but if they don’t get you one way, they get you another.”
Turgeon still was the key.
The junior shortstop set the stage for Fitch’s five-run sixth inning rally with a single. After that, Megan Bondy tripled her home and scored on an error. Cassie Mancini and Taylor Noel singled and winning pitcher Alana Luzzio, a freshman, had the game-winning, two-run single.
“It’s been a lot of work, we have worked so hard on hitting,” Fitch coach Kate Peruzzotti said. “We dedicate so much time in practice to hitting, we do every drill imaginable and I have to say, that most of these kids have come so far from where we started.”
Peruzzotti is obviously pleased with the improvement of players like Mancini and Kassidy Manley in the middle of the order, but the team still rotates around one key bat; Turgeon.
“She’s our go-to player, there’s no one you would rather have up with runners on base,” Peruzzotti said.
The offense and the improvement of Luzzio (9-2) in the circle has led the Falcons to a 14-3 record and the win over NFA clinched second-place in the ECC Large Division for the Falcons.
But can this team repeat what last year’s team did?
Peruzzotti’s answer to that was “Why not? Why not us?”
“I think we have a very good chance to go far in the state tournament,” Bondy said. “We have the ability, we have the skill, as long as we bring our ‘A’ game every time, we have a chance.”
One thing the Falcons have going for them; no pressure.
“I don’t think that we’re the same team by any means, but in some ways, I think we’re better,” Peruzzotti said. “We don’t expect to not give up a run, so when we do, it doesn’t phase them and last year it did a little bit I think, because they were good and people weren’t supposed to score runs against them. These guys, they’re like ‘Hey, they’re going to score runs, we just need to score more.’ “