The pressure was on.
And the South Hunterdon softball team responded.
The Eagles fended off a comeback attempt by Lawrenceville to defeat the visiting Big Red, 3-2, in a nonleague game on Tuesday at Ely Memorial Field in Lambertville.
South Hunterdon (10-6) used a two-out rally to score two runs in the bottom of the third inning. Danella Silagy singled, then scored on a double by Georgia Andreoli, who scored on a base hit by Cambria Loesch.
That lead held up until the sixth inning, when Lawrenceville capitalized on three consecutive singles and an error to tie the game.
Andreoli, the center fielder, led off the bottom of the sixth with a triple, scoring what would prove to be the winning run on a sacrifice fly by Loesch.
“This was a good win for us,” said Loesch, a senior who is the team’s catcher. “And this was a good game. A lot of our games are mercy rules, where either we win by a lot or lose by a lot. It was great for us to be in a really competitive game and feel the pressure.
“That’s half the fun of the game, and it’s amazing how much that changes everyone’s attitude.
“Also, in the playoffs, those are the kinds of games we’re going to be playing. We won’t be in mercy rule games. It’s good to have these games now because as we go into states we’re going to be facing harder teams.
“I think our team can go pretty far and I’m really looking forward to seeing what we can do.”
A senior, Andreoli helped run the team’s winter training program.
“It really gave me the ability to look at the team differently, and that was a great experience,” she said. “I got to spend time with the girls one-on-one and that was the best part. I learned about each girl personally and that was the best experience I’ve had in softball.”
Freshman Elsie Scheetz was on the mound for South Hunterdon. She gave up seven hits, fanned eight and did not issue a walk.
“I didn’t really feel much pressure,” said Scheetz, who has been playing softball since third grade. “I know how to play the game and I trust my teammates. It was very nice to get those two runs pretty early. That made me really happy.
“They tied it up but I didn’t panic because I know my team has my back and I know we have good hitters so I had confidence that we could score. It was such a big relief to see that third run score.”
According to Scheetz, the team is a nice mix of younger and older players.
“We have a lot of good seniors and a lot of girls in my grade who are really good so I can see us going far, getting to states,” she said. “I’m very hopeful for the future here.”
The win came a day after a rough, 15-0 mercy rule loss to the Hun School.
“It felt great to be hitting today because I didn’t do well against Hun,” said Andreoli, who went 3-for-3 with a pair of doubles and a triple. “They had a very challenging pitcher. I went into it thinking I would be fine and I didn’t do as well as I wanted to.”
She will play softball next year at Caldwell University, where she is unsure of a major.
The Eagles return to action on Friday night, hosting New Hope-Solebury in a nonleague contest at 7 p.m.
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