By RICK SPRUNGER
DECATUR — Give it up for Kara Brown.
Brown, a freshman pitcher with just 16 innings of varsity work all season, was the surprise starting pitcher for Norwell in its sectional semi-final bout with Maconaquah at Bellmont Tuesday night.
All Brown did by way of response was retire the first 12 batters she faced while finishing with a one-hitter in an 11-1 win over the Braves.
Norwell, now 15-10 on the season, will play for the championship on Thursday at 5:30 against Peru, a come-from-behind 8-6 winner over Bellmont in the other semi-final.
Maconaquah finished its season with an 8-16 record.
“I have confidence in my pitching staff,” said Norwell coach Kevin Baird of the unconventional move after the game. “(Brown) is very poised,” he added about his starter. “She’s a good kid, and she’s been a consistent pitcher all season, whether she was pitching varsity or JV.”
Brown took control of the contest early, retiring the side in order in each of the first four innings.
And, with her team having scored 10 runs through its four at-bats, Brown stood just three outs away from completing a perfect game.
Was she aware of that?
“No,” grinned her coach. “We try not to tell them things like that.”
Maconaquah’s Shaela Brazzel, a freshman herself, broke it up with a leadoff single to left field in the fifth.
A couple of errors in the field and a passed ball enabled Maconaquah to score an unearned run and force Norwell to bat one more time.
But when Delaney Connett hit a one-out single off first baseman Madi Wibel’s glove, stole second, took third on an infield out, and scored on a wild pitch, the game was over.
“She’s a spin pitcher,” Baird explained about Brown’s effectiveness. “She has a lot of different movement pitches. She hits her spots. And then she has a spin on top of all that.”
Norwell gave Brown plenty of run support.
The Knights scored a pair of runs in the second inning on singles by Kaydance Clark and Elle Misch wrapped around a walk.
Then they opened the floodgates in the third courtesy of some sloppy Maconaquah fielding.
The Braves committed four errors in the field, three of them by Brazzel at shortstop.
The Knights used those errors and singles by Reese Frauhiger and Misch to add four runs.
“We’ve told our players that if they hit the ball hard, good things happen,” said Baird. “Sometimes the ball gives you a gift. You might get a hit. You might get a bad hop, you might get an error in the infield. If you keep it down, it’s going to take three things to get you out. It has to be fielded clean, it has to be thrown clean, and it has to be caught clean.”
The Knights plated four more runs in the fourth inning on hits by Connett, Frauhiger, Clark, and Nevada Lenwell, a walk, and a wild pitch.
Connett, Frauhiger, Clark, and Misch each ended up with two hits to pace a nine-hit Norwell attack, all of them singles.
Still, this game belonged to Brown.
“See that playmaker plaque she’s wearing around her neck?” asked Baird, gesturing toward Brown in the center of a team picture, all of them posing in goofy cowboy hats. “We award that to the player of the game. She won that award tonight.”
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