It didn’t take long for Tyrone Lady Eagle junior Hilary McNelis to get into top form. McNelis opened the high school softball season by tossing a four-inning no-hitter in the field and collecting three hits in four trips to the plate on offense. McNelis and her teammates buried Huntingdon 15-0 in a Mountain Athletic Conference (MAC) Division 2 win.
While McNelis didn’t need much help on the mound, she got plenty of it at bat in a contest played at the Harry K. Sickler Athletic Complex.
Freshman Stefani Bryan also banged out three hits and drove in six RBIs and classmate Kim Cherry went two-for-three , Missy Stager scored four times, Heather Stanton scored three times and McNelis, Cherry and Meghan McAllister twice each to make it an easy win just out of the gate. Nine Lady Eagles batted and everyone had at least one hit in a team effort from the top to the bottom of the lineup.
The Lady Eagles started slowly with just a single first-inning run over the first two frames. Tyrone began to open up the game a bit with five tallies in the third inning and then ended the game early with a nine-run fourth that stopped the game via the Mercy Rule.
McNelis was nearly perfect, with just two Lady Bearcats reaching base, Jess Morris on a first-inning error, then only mistake by the Eagles in the field and Olivia Hallinan walked in the third inning. Both reached with two outs and neither advanced any further than first base.
“Stefani Bryan simply pounded the ball tonight, “ said Tyrone head softball coach Lois Loncher. “Hilary really pitched a great game starting out the season for us. It’s always good to start out the year with a win. We were tight and overanxious for the first couple innings, but then we started hitting the ball.”
Tyrone 15 Huntingdon 0
HUNTINGDON – Runk, c, 2-0-0; Isenberg, rf, 2-0-0; Morris, p-1b, 2-0-0; Joha, 3b, 2-0-0; Young, ss, 2-0-0; Snyder, lf, 1-0-0; French, 2b, 1-0-0; Shawley, cf, 1-0-0; Hallman, 1b-p, 0-0-0. TOTALS 13-0-0.
TYRONE – Whitby, cf, 4-0-1; Stanton, 1b, 1-3-1; Stager, ss, 2-4-1; McNelis, p, 4-2-3; Bryan, 3b, 4-1-3; Cherry, c, 3-2-2; McAllister, dp, 3-2-1; Schreckengost, lf, 2-1-1; Ripka, 2b, 3-0-1; Pennabaker, rf, 0-0-0. TOTALS 26-15-14.
Huntingdon 000 0 0-0.
Tyrone 105 9 15-14.
Multiple Hits: T-McNelis (3), Bryan (3), Cherry (2).
RBI: Bryan 6, McNelis 2, Schreckengost 1, Stager 1, McAllister 1.
SO: T-McNelis 4.
BB: H- Morris 2, Hallman T-McNelis 1.
WP: McNelis LP: Morris
