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MINOOKA — The Oswego softball team’s battery of pitcher Jaelynn Anthony and Kiyah Chavez seems to have a unique chemistry.
That bond has helped the Panthers to a 30-1 record after beating Minooka 10-0 on Monday to clinch the Southwest Prairie Conference title over the Indians, the team that beat them out for the title last season. It was also a rematch of last season’s Class 4A supersectional in which Oswego came away with a 5-2 victory en route to a third-place state finish.
Anthony would not cross the first-base line to warm up for the bottom of the first inning until Chavez, who was already behind the plate, came to her to perform their pregame handshake ritual.
The two were on the same page virtually all game as Anthony fired a six-hit shutout. They seemed to share the same connection at the plate as well, as both went 3 for 4 with two doubles and a home run. The only difference was that Chavez had four RBIs and Anthony had three.
“Jaelynn and I are best friends,” Iowa recruit Chavez said. “Everyone calls us ‘The Hooligan Sisters’ because when we are together we are kind of crazy. I am not like that normally, but Jaelynn just brings it out of me.
“Winning the conference was definitely one of our goals this season. We knew we could do it, and we did it. We are 30-1 right now, and not many other teams can say that. The thing about our team is that we hate losing. If we are behind, we will find a way to work out of it. Some teams get behind by five or six runs and you can see they think it’s over. We aren’t like that. We’ve been behind by that much and came back. We don’t care what the score is, we are going to play hard and try to win.”
Anthony got the Panthers (30-1, 14-1) on the board with a solo home run to center into a strong wind in the top of the second. In the top of the third, Chavez homered to left-center, bringing home Adalynn Fugitt (3 for 4, 3 runs), who had reached on a single, for a 3-0 lead. Anthony led off the top of the fourth with a double to right-center, and courtesy runner Maddie Lohrman scored on a single by Rikka Ludvigson (2 for 4) for a 4-0 lead.
That was more than enough for Anthony. The Purdue-bound junior scattered the six Minooka hits as the Indians (21-12, 12-2) did not advance a runner past second base all game. Anthony was also strong down the stretch, retiring the final eight batters she faced.
Chavez put Oswego ahead 6-0 in the fifth inning with a two-run double that scored both Savannah Page and Fugitt, who had both singled. The Panthers added four in the top of the seventh, highlighted by a two-run double by Anthony.
“It’s great to clinch the conference, but we are still taking it one game at a time,” Oswego assistant coach Annie Scaramuzzi said. “One of our goals was to win the conference, and it makes it a little more special to do it against Minooka, the team that beat us out for conference last year.
“We have been producing big hits from 1-9 in the lineup. The bottom part of the order does a great job of getting on so that the others can drive them in. We also played very good defense today.”
For Minooka, it was a fourth straight loss after winning 11 of 12.
“We got runners on, but we couldn’t get them around,” Minooka coach Mark Brown said. “The last time we played them (a 10-8 loss), we scored eight runs. We had runners on today, but it was one of those days when we couldn’t get that big hit with runners on.
“We are in a bit of a funk right now. The loss to Plainfield North was a pretty tough one. We have a couple more games before the postseason starts to get us back on the right track."