Kaitlyn Klepper on her outstanding CG shutout in a 1-0 victory to send the Junior Ducks to the championship of the East Coast Labor Day Bash pic.twitter.com/ebcMnRuv75
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) September 2, 2018
With the bases loaded and only one out in the second inning, it was a rocky situation for any young pitcher.
Fortunately for the Junior Ducks, their pitcher, 12-year-old Kaitlyn Klepper was the most prepared player on the field. The young hurler induced a come backer to the mound, she fielded the ball, composed herself and fired a strike to the catcher, who fired it to first to complete the inning-ending 1-2-3 double play and escape the inning unscathed. She let out a big fist pump and headed back to the dugout. That was the closest that the opposition came to getting on the board all day.
“I was hoping for a comebacker so I could throw home and I knew my catcher, Tony, would throw to first and that’s a double play to get out of that,” she said.
As if that confidence and composure was not impressive enough, she didn’t allow another runner to reach third base the remainder of the game. In order to get the win, though, the offense would need to come though.
Her counterpart, Christian Boswell, was equally effective for much of the game. The lone blemish really wasn’t his fault either. Junior Ducks SS Mike Lazaridis hit a routine pop up behind the mound that wound up dropping in. It went down for a single because it was untouched but it proved to be a costly miscue. Lazaridis got himself into scoring position by swiping second, but the next two batters were retired. That brought up, Paulie Hutnik, who put together a lengthy at bat, fouling off a couple of tough pitches before ripping an RBI single to left field that proved to be the difference in the game.
The Junior Ducks strike first on an RBI single by Paulie Hutnik to drive in Mike Lazaridis. They lead 1-0 Top 5 pic.twitter.com/mWFmaAFyq6
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) September 2, 2018
Klepper worked around a leadoff single in the fifth to Matteo Tufano to retire the next three batters. Things did get a bit dicey in the sixth inning as Oil City threatened with a two-out walk to Anthony Rivera, but Klepper stepped up and struck out the final batter for her fifth punchout of the game.
They will advance to play in the championship tomorrow of the East Coast Labor Day Bash. We will have coverage of that as well as the 14U division.
