Caruso's Bomb Not Enough For Dodgers Softball

CHATHAM—Facing one of its toughest opponents and conference leader, the Madison High School softball team was outscored 10-2 at the bats of rival Chatham Wednesday in Chatham.

"Chatham is the best team in the conference. They are well coached. She [Chatham coach Alexis Davies] does a great job with a bunch of good players," said Madison coach Hector Martinez.

While Chatham is a good team, the Dodgers had a few elements against them. The field that the game switched to is a turf field, which the Dodgers are not use to playing or pitching on. Additionally, the weather proved to make the ball slippery resulting in uncharacteristic wild pitches from Nicole Iannarone.

The Dodgers kept a close game in the first three innings.

Chatham quickly scored a run after its leadoff batter, Alex St. Romain reached on a walk and stole both second and third before being driven in.

In the first inning both Iannarone and Nikki Caruso hit solid singles, but the team was unable to capitalize with runners on base. After exchanging a pair of one, two, three half innings in the second, Chatham's Alex St. Romain led the third inning off with a homerun.

Going into the fourth inning, Madison trailed by a small two run deficit.

The fourth inning proved to be the highest scoring for both Chatham and Madison. In the top of the inning a series of singles, errors, and walks led to Chatham scoring seven runs and leading the Dodgers nine to nothing going into the bottom of the inning.

In the bottom of the fourth Julianna Vezza led the inning off by drawing a walk. Nikki Caruso immediately followed by hitting a long fly ball to right field and was able to get around the bases in time for a two run home run.

"I just wanted to get our team on the board," said Caruso. "I was just looking to hit the ball hard."

Caruso's two-run home run brought the score to 9-2. Chatham tacked its final run of the game in the fifth inning.

In the bottom of the seventh Madison had a spark of hope when Rosalyn Blake came to the plate. With one out Blake lined the ball down the middle so hard that the ball rolled into a shared lacrosse field. Blake recorded a triple on the hit.

"I was really pumped about it [the hit]," Blake said. "I have a lot more confidence than I had at the beginning of the season."

Unfortunately, Blake would be the only batter who reached base for the Dodgers in the inning.

Moving toward the end of the season Martinez is "hopeful that we learned something watching and seeing how a great team plays."

Madison will play the Academy of St. Elizabeth at 4 p.m. on Thursday in an away game.