By Steve Bigham

The Newtown High School softball team is hoping its strong regular season finish will continue as it heads into next week’s CIAC Class LL state tournament. The name of its first round opponent had not been released at press time, although most expected it would be an away game.

The Nighthawks finished with wins over Kolbe-Cathedral and Weston then had to wait out this week for the states. The eight-team South-West Conference playoffs were taking place this year, an event Newtown missed by just a game.

Still, next week is an entirely new season and Newtown knows it has the potential to make some noise. But it’s going to take more than just good pitching, something Newtown has had all season. Newtown will need to play near-errorless ball, get base runners on and come up with timely hits.

“When we play clean defense we’re going to be there because we have a lineup that should be able to produce a few runs every game. Our offensive success revolves around our leadoff batter getting on. We need the Ramsdells and the Fentons to get on base for the Bouteillers and the Caposellas,” explained coach Paul LaFrancesca.

To date, Newtown’s season has seen mixed results. It managed to beat four of the teams that qualified for the SWC’s, but it also lost a handful of games against teams it should have beaten. Three of them were heartbreak losses.

“We gave away three games, just gave them away,” LaFrancesca said. “We lost to Pomperaug late on a judgement call, lost to New Milford in the last inning, and we were one out away from beating Jonathan Law in the seventh inning which we lost. If we pull them out, we would have been the sixth seed in the tournament. We really only have ourselves to blame.”

Newtown defeated Weston, 3-0, May 15 as freshman Trina Ramsdell picked up the win in her first pitching performance of her high school career. Ramsdell pitched four innings of shutout ball before giving way to Kristin Caposella, who pitched three innings of no-hit ball. Ramsdell helped her cause by hitting a two-run homer in the third inning. Ramsdell also singled in the first inning and, after stealing second, came home on a grounder off the bat of Kate Bouteiller.

Lindsey Blomberg collected two hits in the win and Nicole Mangarella had another standout game at second base where she has been playing consistently since Ramsdell was moved to center field.

On May 16, Newtown traveled to Seaside Park in Bridgeport where it knocked off a feisty Kolbe team, 4-0. Caposella gave up a leadoff hit in the first inning then pitched no-hit ball the rest of the way. In the fourth, Kolbe threatened, only to be shut down on a fine double play by Bouteiller, who fielded the ball from her shortstop position, stepped on second, then fired to Amanda Marsilio at first.

Mangarella scored what turned out to be the game-winning run in the fourth inning when she singled, took second on Heather Morgan’s sacrifice bunt, advanced to third on a wild pitch and scored on a Marsilio ground out.

Newtown added three runs in the sixth on base hits by Marsilio, Ramsdell, Bouteiller and Caposella.

Newtown’s mediocre record belied some of its impressive stats this season. For example, Newtown out stole its opponents, 82-23, for the season.

“I expect to get some wins in that tournament. Last year we won one game and lost one. Hopefully we can take a step in the right direction in the tournament and win at least two games. As you win in that tournament stranger things can happen,” he said.

NOTE: Senior Kate Bouteiller was named to the All-SWC team after receiving Honorable Mention as a sophomore and All Colonial as a junior. Also, Kristin Caposella and Trina Ramsdell were named to the All-Colonial team while Lauren Blomberg and Heather Morgan received Honorable Mention.