Olympia casts shadow in doubleheader

MARYSVILLE — The Olympia Pizza softball team added a pair of wins to their record June 18, with spring league playoffs looming in the coming weeks.

MARYSVILLE — The Olympia Pizza softball team added a pair of wins to their record June 18, with spring league playoffs looming in the coming weeks.

Olympia defeated the Slackers in a city league softball doubleheader at M-PHS, winning the first game 11-9 and the second 13-2. The victorious team is a tight-knit group of couples, whose softball days go back almost 10 years.

“We played together about five or six years and then we took a break. Everyone started having babies,” said coach Shane Freeman of the team’s exodus that ended this spring. “Now, three years later, we’re back.”

Time didn’t seem to corrode their skills though — in game one, Olympia accumulated 17 hits, with every player in the batting order getting on base at least once. A walk got them started in the bottom of the first inning for two runs, but the home team really built their lead in the second, with five consecutive batters scoring base hits. While the Slackers were unable to get the fly out against Olympia, they executed well on base, getting outs two and three by stopping the lead runner.

With 10 runs in Olympia’s column by the time the fourth inning was in the books, an eight-run advantage, the Slackers started to rally, in fashion that might seem typical if one read something into their name.

Coach-player Dan Lowes led off with a single, followed by first baseman Faun Birch’s second of two strikes into the outfield. The next five batters tallied four RBIs, and the momentum carried the Slackers into the seventh where they added three more runs. But with two outs and a co-ed rule that would enforce a third out looming in their lineup, the math ultimately worked against the Slackers.

Solid hitting propelled Olympia to victory as three players batted 1.000 — Eddie Phelps, Jen Brown and coach Freeman — and three-hole hitter John Buell was 3-for-4 with an error accounting for his fourth on-base appearance.

“Pretty much our whole team hits pretty well,” Freeman said. “Guys hit the ball well, girls hit the ball well. We’re out there for fun.”