Cloquet Girls Pick Up Two Wins On Tuesday

May 10

Kerry Rodd-NSO

The Cloquet girls softball team picked up a little momentum on Tuesday afternoon with a pair of wins over Superior and Hermantown. The wins came at a good time after a loss to Virginia on Monday on a walkoff home run.

Chandler Beaupre got the Jacks off to a good start Tuesday by pitching Cloquet to a 17-4 win in Superior. Starting her first game, the youngster hurled a five-hitter, struck out three and gave up just one earned run.

Dalyce Gustafson belted out three hits in leading the Cloquet hitting barrage. Included in Gustafson’s three hits were a double and a pair of RBIs and three runs scored. Makenzie Korby also had three hits with a double, an RBI and two runs scored. The other Lumberjack to smack out three hits was Shania Paulson, who also scored twice and added an RBI.

Things got a whole lot tougher following the Superior game as the Jacks had to load their bus and then travel to Hermantown to play the #5 state ranked Hawks. Cloquet got off to a quick start and had leads of 3-0 and 4-1, but eventually Hermantown showed their resilience and fought back.

Cloquet senior pitcher Denise Rodd managed to keep the Hawks off the board in the final inning after Paulson had given them the lead in the top of the sixth. The game ended when Rodd induced a grounder to shortstop Gustafson which turned into a 6-4-3 double play with Kelly Carlson acting as the middle person in the double play and Alyssa Michaelson nabbing the ball at first to end the game.

Rodd gave up 10 hits in the game, while Katie Thun gave up just six hits for the Hawks. Paulson had a double and an RBI; Michaelson also had a double and scored twice.

Leading the Hawks attack was senior Sarah Stansfield who went 3-for-3 and Celine Francisco who was 3-for-4.

**Earlier in the day the Hawks downed Proctor 15-8 behind Thun’s 13 strike-out performance.

Carmen Palondino homered for the Hawks and had two hits and Celine Francisco went 3-for-5.

Kaylin Mottonen led the Rails with a home run.

Kerry Rodd can be reached at kerry@northlandsportsonline.com