Jessica Butler was again a driving force in the latest Towson Catholic title run. The sophomore pitched a one-hitter and struck out 15 in the Owls' 1-0 over St. Paul's Sunday afternoon at Harford Community College.
St. Paul's coach John Meil (right) talks to Joanna Durham before her at-bat Sunday. For the second straight year, the Gators fell short in the championship round.
sophomore Rebekah Alban had one thing on her mind when she strode to the plate in the bottom of the sixth inning of Sunday's IAAM C Conference softball championship: break her team's 0-0 stalemate with
St. Paul's School.
The third baseman delivered with a searing triple to left-center field that ended with her advancing to home off an overthrown ball to third base. The run gave the Owls (20-2) their second consecutive championship with a 1-0 victory at Harford Community College.
"It was amazing," Alban said of her at-bat. "I just said, 'I need to get a hit here. I can't get a hit here. I need to do this for my team. I need to get this hit.' "
Even though she saw her hit "soar" into the outfield, Alban had no idea the throw to third had bounced into her team's dugout. She looked around as her teammates jumped up and down frantically, commanding her to touch home plate.
"I was running as fast I could," Alban said with a beaming smile. "I needed a nice hit so I took a chance."
Coach Wayne Smith said it was the defining moment of the contest.
“I said, ‘that’s all we need today, because we were on.’ Pitching and catching was on,” Smith said.
No one was more relieved to see Alban cross the plate than classmate, and pitcher, Jessica Butler. The team's ace allowed just one hit, which came in the sixth inning at the hands of St. Paul's senior Rebecca Kelly, and walked two batters on the day.
Butler, who has already committed to the University of Maryland, was scintillating, striking out 15 Gators (15-4) in the championship. Despite saying that she wasn’t nervous, Butler was being pushed to near perfection because of the performance of St. Paul's pitcher Sarah Meil, who struck out 10 Towson Catholic batters.
"Sarah pitched an amazing game," Butler said. "She got us really off balance."St. Paul's coach John Meil, Sarah's father, said he could not have gotten a better performance on the mound.
Neither pitcher budged willingly.
"It was a matter of who was going to blink first," John Meil said. "In baseball you can make all the mistakes you want and still win. In [fast pitch softball]? No."
After winning two titles in a row, Towson Catholic must decide by Tuesday which level they will move up: the A or B Conference. The Owls beat all four of their B Conference opponents this past season, but lost both games against A Conference teams.
"If we go to B, we're pretty confident we can dominate there because we've scrimmaged some teams and beat all of them," Butler said. "We scrimmaged teams in A and we took our lumps. If we want to get better, we have to play the better teams."
For now, though, the Owls are going to revel in their perfect conference season.
“That was our goal this year, to go undefeated... we had a loss to [St. Paul’s] last year, 4-3,” Smith said. “They’ve been a thorn in our side. They’re very good team and that’s what we like. We want to play the best.”
IAAM C Conference Softball Championship
at Harford Community College
Towson Catholic 1, St. Paul's 0SP 000 000 0 0 1 0
TC 000 001 X 1 3 0
Meil and Kelly; Butler and Smith.
2B: TC-Butler 2.
3B: TC-Alban.
C Conference Bracket