BY WENDI REARDON
Clarkston News Sports Writer
Lady Hitters had a winning weekend at the Anchor Bay tournament as they went 3-2 during the two days.
“Overall we did pretty good,” said Don Peters, head coach for Clarkston Varsity Softball.
Highlights included Abby Skvarce having 13 consecutive hits while also going 26-for-38 with 22 RBIs, three home runs, one triple and seven doubles.
“She had an amazing weekend,” Peters added. “It’s pretty special.”
Sarah Gladding pitched two wins on Sunday with a shutout against Grosse Pointe North, with four strikeouts in seven innings.
She pitched five innings against L’Anse Creuse with three strikeouts in the win.
“She only game up one run in the two games,” Peters said.
The Lady Wolves went 1-2 in the first day of the tournament. They had a 6-4 win over L’Anse Creuse North as they scored four runs in the third inning and two in the fourth inning. Skvarce hit 2-for-2 with one RBI. Maddy Scarsella had two RBIs. Paige Blevins, Hannah Chadwell and Maddie Beck had one RBI each. Gladding pitched five innings with three strikeouts.
They opened the day with a 11-6 loss to Waterford Kettering as the Captains scored seven of their runs in the third inning.
Skvarce went 3-for-3 with a double and a home run with two RBIs. Mariah Hood went 2-for-3. Kaylee Percival had a double and Blevins hit a home run. Blevins, Beck and Savannah Spring had one RBI each.
They lost to Canton, 9-2. Skvarce hit 3-for-3 with a home run and a double and two RBIs. Spring hit 2-for-2.
The Lady Wolves had two wins on Sunday. They defeated L’Anse Creuse, 5-1. Skvarce went 3-for-3 and had two doubles and two RBIs. Beck had two RBIs and Spring had one RBI.
They defeated Grosse Pointe North, 4-0, by grabbing the lead with three runs in the top of the third inning. Blevins, Percival, Skvarce hit a double each. Spring, Chadwell and Blevins had one RBI each. Gladding pitched seven innings and had four strikeouts.
“Hood played really well offensively and defensively,” said Peters. “I had her play a few couple different positions.”
For hitting during the tournament, Spring went 13-for-27 with ten RBIs; Hood had 17 RBIs and two doubles; Blevins 12 RBIs, four doubles and three homeruns, Chadwell had 11 RBIs and Percival had six doubles.
For pitching, Sarah Gladding threw 39 innings and had 26 strikeouts; Sarah Kuenzel threw 18 innings with 11 strikeouts; and Hailey Minton and Blevins pitched four innings each.
“It’s fun to play different schools,” Peters added about the tournament. “It exposes them to a lot of different coaches and all those teams are good. Canton and Kettering are very good teams. We continue to play as competitive a schedule as we can. The next two weeks the tournaments are just loaded with great teams – state ranked teams.”
The Lady Wolves claimed two wins over Oxford, 11-8 and 8-6, April 19.
Clarkston opened the week against Lake Orion on Tuesday and prepare for this Saturday and Sunday as they host the 26th Annual Michigan Stars tournament. It is at Creasey Bicentennial Park in Grand Blanc with 48 varsity softball teams from around Michigan.
“It is probably the most diverse we had had in teams – like Traverse City, Escanaba and Marquette,” said Peters. “It should be a very good tournament.”
He added the team’s strength going into this week continues to be their hitting and going against good pitchers.
“Kettering has an All-State pitcher. We didn’t win the game, but we hit pretty good,” he said. “Hitting they are doing very well. We had eight hits and six runs – that was good. We hit the ball hard. A lot of it is Abby just being on fire. But it’s also other kids to getting big hits.”
Clarkston plays in Pool A on Saturday with Marian, Holly, Almont, L’Anse Creuse North, Anchor Bay and Marquette. They open the day with Pinckney at 8 a.m.

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