This morning, the OH girls softball team left an explosive sendoff to the state championship. For the first time in school history, the team has advanced to IHSA state. The Oswego community and athletic department hosted a sendoff for the books, with decked out school spirit themed buses to the OH marching band making an appearance, the event was surely one to remember.
Even the local fire department joined in the celebration to congratulate our panthers. A crowd of parents, students, and staff joined together to watch their departure.
OH girls softball made history becoming super sectional champions in a tough game against Minooka. Winning that game 5-2, the team will advance to the two-day state final in Peoria this weekend.
“As soon as we got up, we had that one crazy inning where we had to string a lot of hits and honestly we all kind of just knew,“ said junior Rhianna Martinez about the game against Minooka. “Kiyah was doing great up on the plate, and Jaelynn was doing great up on the mound and they have really good chemistry along with our team and once they clicked, they had a feeling.”
The team now boasts the title of sectional champions for the first time in school history against Wheaton North in a nailbiter 1-0 scoring game, as well as regional champions against Yorkville in a blowout 12-2 score.
“We all had to string hits together and focus extra hard and that’s what we did,” said Martinez.
The team will be facing off St.Charles (North) in Peoria at 5:30 pm and will either advance to the championship game on Saturday at 4:30 pm or play for 3rd place on Saturday at 2 pm.
“We were all really insanely surprised, and it was just a huge moment in history because we’re the first softball team in history to make it this far so it’s insane just to be able to accomplish this,” said junior Aubriella Garza.
The team has worked tirelessly throughout the season to ensure top performance for each athlete, Our Panthers played an impressive season. WIth a 13-3 record, they consistently beat out surrounding teams.
“Every single day we do practice, we do workouts and there’s these weeks we have games every single day, we just push through it,” said junior Rikka Ludvigson.
With the championship on Friday, the community can hardly contain their excitement to see the team play.
“I think it’s very exciting for the school and I know a lot of the girls from seeing them during practices, we see them quite a bit during the spring and I know they’ve worked really hard and their coaches have worked really hard with them,” said OH baseball coach John Bachio. “It’s just really exciting for the girls, for the entire school and for the community.”
Hello! I'm Fionnuala Quinn. I'm currently a senior at OHS and this is my third year of journalism. Apart from journalism, I am involved in Cross Country, Track and Field, Best Buddies, and horticulture club. I'm so thrilled to serve as EIC this year!
