New Jersey
Mavreen Hering has succeeded in turning a big negative into a positive for the Irish. And Kingsway had better take note of it before the two teams meet in a semifinal of the Hammonton Tournament on Saturday.
Hering had to rearrange the team, position by position, after the Irish lost two starters to injury in the Rancocas Valley tournament on April 10.
Now they are poised to take on the Dragons after upsetting Sterling and RV in the first two rounds at Hammonton.
Two of the teams still alive in the Hammonton Softball Tournament are Hammonton and Camden Catholic, ranked No. 4 and 8, respectively, in South Jersey by The Inquirer.
Hammonton is riding a nine-game winning streak behind No. 1 pitcher Maria Tortorelli.
Camden Catholic has won its last four games by shutout and pitcher Laura Messina continues to be a force in the circle.
It's too bad for Williamstown that the Braves couldn't get past the first two rounds of the Hammonton Softball Tournament last Saturday.
Williamstown, the defending tournament champ, was missing five seniors, four of whom start. They were on a senior trip to Orlando.
Sunday's semifinals and final were rained out and postponed to this coming Saturday.
Ed Kramer failed to crack the top eight in the high jump Saturday at Franklin Field.
The Cherokee senior reached 6-5 for 12th place.
The winning height was 6-11 1/2, by Oneil Sandiford of Paul Robeson.
Willingboro and Cherry Hill East won their heats in the South Jersey Small and Large schools' 4x400, respectively.
Buena and Millville placed sixth and eighth, respectively, in the 4x400-meter race Saturday morning to qualify for the evening Championship of America race.
Singuan McClellan, Phil Guilford, Tyler Hillgrabe and Juan Jackson were clocked in 3:31.72 for Buena.
Kwame Wright, Josh Cassady, Anthony Felice and Nate Davis had a time of 3:36.83 for Millville.
I got to Franklin Field at 8:20 a.m. and this place is filling up, fast.
So you'd better get here in a hurry.
Pitman's Chelsea Cioffi and Pleasantville's Dontaye Rivera tried their best Thursday at the Penn Relays, but they didn't qualify for the finals in their events.
Cioffi placed 12th in the discus throw (122-4) and Rivera's stats weren't in at the time of this blog. However, I was at the event and the cutoff for the finals was 17 meters even. Rivera's best throw was 15-40.
Friday afternoon I walked from Franklin Field to Penn's soccer field area to watch Cinnaminson's Kyle McDevitt throw the javelin. However, the junior never showed up for the event: the Javelin Throw Championship, part of the Penn Relays' field program.
McDevitt is the defending South Jersey Group 2 champoin in the javelin throw.
