By RUSSELL JONES
The Otters struggled in their first game of the season against Brattleboro as Hailey Derosia tossed a 5-inning gem for the Colonels. Derosia struck out 14 of the 17 batters she faced in the no-hitter, as Brattleboro defeated the Otters, 15-0.
“Because of the weather, we weren’t able to get any scrimmages in and this is the first live pitching we’ve seen,” coach Kelly Trayah said. “It’s natural we’re going to have a few cobwebs to work out and Derosia is one of the best pitchers in the state.”
The Otters first eight batters went down on strikeouts before Derosia gave up her first base runner on a walk. After recording the next out, she struck out six of the next seven batters, giving up only an additional walk as the Otter Valley squad could not get anything going against the fireballing pitcher.
OV pitcher Morgan LaPorte, however, got beat up by the Colonels’ hitters in her first time on the mound for the team. LaPorte gave up three runs in the first inning and two in the second before the Colonels batted around in the third frame and scored six.
The Otters were able to hold Brattleboro scoreless as they retired the first three batters of the fourth inning, but gave up four more runs in the last inning.
“I thought Morgan did well, she maintained her composure up there,” Trayah said. “We need to get the outs and shorten the innings. We made too many errors.”
The Otter defense committed six errors, all leading to scoring by the Colonels. Coach Toni Poalino said the team is still working out the kinks and trying to find their alignment but there were a few bright spots in the tough outing.
“Shayla Phillips tracked the ball well in the outfield,” Poalino said. “Compared to where she was last year, her game has improved remarkably. She’s building confidence and that’s helping her not be as indecisive as she was early on.”
The Otters will face another tough team on Tuesday as they face Rutland.“We actually got to watch Rutland play last week,” Poalino said. “Our game got canceled, so we went to watch them play. That may be one time the weather will have helped us out this season.”
