Crown Point pitcher Paige Liezert needs only one run in state championship game. Lexi Smith gives it to her.
WEST LAFAYETTE, Indiana — Senior designated player Lexi Smith scored the go-ahead run on a fly ball by junior left fielder Nevaeh Rangel and freshman shortstop Lulu Johnston added a run-scoring single to back junior pitcher Paige Liezert's nine-inning gem as Crown Point edged Center Grove 2-0 in the Class 4A state championship game at Purdue's Bittinger Stadium on Saturday.
The Bulldogs (31-4) added their second state title to their first won in 2017 after the game was suspended by weather on Friday night.
Liezert, an Illinois-Chicago commit, was dominant against the Trojans (26-4). She scattered four hits, walked two and struck out 16.
Crown Point's Angie Richwalski becomes the second person to win a state title in softball as a coach after winning one as a player. She was a sophomore on Lake Central's 2004 state championship team. She joins Beth Zachary, who won the 2001 3A title as a player for Castle and won the 2023 4A title as Penn's coach.
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New York Times
3 hours ago
- New York Times
Big Cheers for No. 14, Pope Leo, at the Ballpark
Visuals by Jamie Kelter Davis Text by Ruth Graham Tens of thousands of Catholic Chicagoans and others gathered in the stands at Rate Field on Saturday afternoon for a celebration of the election of Pope Leo XIV. The joyful atmosphere at the park was a testament to faith: in the Church, in the son of Chicago who now leads it, in the White Sox, or in some combination of all three. Cardinal Blase J. Cupich said the event was designed as 'an opportunity to say that there's a lot of good that happens in Chicago.' The new pope, the former Robert Prevost, grew up in a modest brick home in a south suburb, Dolton, just on the other side of the city line, and is a confirmed Sox fan. 'We want to celebrate that he's not only from America, but he's from Chicago, and he's from the South Side,' said Rose Carlson, 42, as she filed into the ballpark with her husband, Eric. The couple saw Leo's election as a good omen for their team, noting that he was photographed days earlier sporting the team's black-and-white cap with his white papal cassock. With his election, 'the White Sox went worldwide,' Ms. Carlson said. 'Now they're higher than the Cubs.' They were both wearing Sox jerseys with 'LEO 14' on the back. More than 30,000 tickets to the event sold out within days of the announcement last month, organizers said. The ballpark, which has a capacity of 40,615 for White Sox games, was about half full on Saturday. The weather was sunny and mild, what might objectively be described as a perfect day. As crowds began to gather outside around noon, the mood was buoyant, with young people playing guitars, drumming and dancing. Inside, people waited in line to take photographs with cardboard cutouts of Leo in his papal robes, as well as by a fresh mural commemorating Leo's visit to the ballpark for Game 1 of the World Series in 2005, the last time the White Sox won the title. The event began with an eclectic program that included a welcome from a White Sox representative, who noted that Chicago baseball greats Paul Konerko and Ernie Banks both wore the number 14. The crowd also heard an original song about Leo's life with lyrics like, 'Called into the Vatican dicastery, where he dealt with problems and bureaucracy.' Students from Our Lady of Mount Carmel Academy also appeared onstage in their costumes from a mock conclave the school held in early May, before Pope Leo was selected from their hometown. (Their selection was a fourth- grader named Augie, who took the papal name Pope Augustine.) At the Mass that followed the program, Bible passages were read in Spanish, Polish and English, as well as prayers in Tagalog and other languages. Songs included traditional hymns, a popular Spanish praise song, and the spiritual 'Wade in the Water.' 'It's the joy of knowing there's so much that unites us,' said Maria Torres, 37, who had traveled in a group of 15 family members from Kewanee, Ill., about 150 miles outside the city. 'There are so many identities here, so many cultures, values, traditions and languages, but it's one person that unites us all.' At the culmination of the Mass, nearly 500 lay ministers and ushers dispersed throughout the stadium to distribute Communion. Elsewhere in the city and across the country, demonstrators were pouring into parks and streets, after a week in which President Trump deployed the National Guard and the Marines to Los Angeles in response to protests over immigration raids. Cardinal Cupich alluded to the turmoil in his homily. 'It is wrong to scapegoat those who are here without documents,' he said, to cheers from many in the stands. 'They are here due to a broken immigration system which both parties have failed to fix.' Leo himself made an appearance of sorts, in the form of a video message recorded at the Vatican and displayed on the large digital display looming above the outfield. In his first public address to an American audience, he encouraged young people to see themselves as 'beacons of hope.' After the Mass, the music continued, with a break for a familiar ballpark refrain. The crowd laughed with recognition, and then joined in: 'Let's go, Leo,' they chanted. 'Let's go!'
Yahoo
4 hours ago
- Yahoo
"Isiah has to own up to his own problem" - Magic Johnson said Isiah Thomas needs to look in the mirror over Dream Team snub
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Indianapolis Star
5 hours ago
- Indianapolis Star
He thought his error was a season-ender... Then he scored winning run to send team to state final
MOORESVILLE – Evansville North left fielder Tyler Land seized the opportunity to atone for what looked like a season-ending mistake late Saturday night during the Class 4A semistate championship game against Center Grove. Land dropped a seventh inning fly ball from Grady Grant, allowing the runner to advance to second base. Grant moved to third on a wild pitch, putting the winning run 90 feet from home. Reliever Conner Watson got the Huskies out of the jam, forcing extra innings, but Land's redemption arc was not complete. Land led off the ninth inning with a single. Jake Wilke's double moved him to third, and Land came home on a wild pitch, scoring the eventual winning run and sending the Huskies to a 2-1 victory over the Trojans. Evansville North (25-8) advances to face Valparaiso (25-5) in the Class 4A championship game Saturday at Victory Field. "I was down, my head was down coming into the dugout and coach (Jeremy) Jones told me to keep my head up," Land said after his late-game error. "All my teammates had my back. They just said, 'flush it'. It didn't hurt the team, nothing to hang my head about, it was in the past." Overcoming Land's error was just one of the heroic efforts Evansville North used to hold off Center Grove. A walk and an error put a runner on third with no outs in the bottom of the eighth. With runners on the corners and one out, the Huskies moved their center fielder Mason Renfro to the infield, playing with just two outfielders to prevent anything on the ground from getting through. Reliever A.J. Baggett forced two fly ball outs, both to Land, ending the inning and setting up the Huskies' winning run in the ninth. "We talk a lot about culture and heart, and more than anything else — we don't kill the baseball, our defense is OK, pitching is pretty good, but more than anything else — we have heart," Jones said. "Ty made the mistake but we told him, 'That's OK.' For him to come up and hit that missile up the middle, I'm so proud of him." Land finished 2-for-4 with one RBI and one run scored. Daniel Cranick and Carson Conley added two hits each. Evansville North's ability to produce with runners in scoring position was something Center Grove failed to do all night. The Trojans left 12 runners on base and had just one hit with runners in scoring position. Carson Bush drove in Center Grove's lone run with an RBI single in the fifth. Evansville North starter Braden Perry, Watson and Baggett allowed just five hits and one earned run over nine innings. Kellen Thomson pitched five scoreless innings for Center Grove. Andrew Murphy took the loss, allowing one run and two hits over four innings, striking out five. "It's demoralizing," Center Grove coach Keith Hatfield said of the inability to score with runners in scoring position. "Six times we left two guys on, that's not normally what we do. ... To go through that and leave as many guys on base as we did, that's not characteristic." Heading to Victory Field puts Evansville North one win away from completing a Cinderella season. The Huskies started the season 2-2, pulled out three close wins before losing to Evansville Memorial 11-1. Evansville North went just 5-4 in the Southern Indiana Conference, but the Huskies caught fire when it mattered most and are heading to the championship game on a seven-game win streak. "It's never the same guy. It could be our 15th guy on the bench, it doesn't matter," Jones said. "These guys believe in each other, they love each other, they're truly a family. And I'm so proud of them."
