Naperville Central Pitcher Nearly Perfect in Match with Plainfield North

Plainfield North helped out Alyssa Wunderlich and her Naperville Central softball teammates on a day when they really didn’t need a hand.

The host Tigers made a trio of errors that allowed the Redhawks (3-1) to score eight runs in the top of the first inning and that was way more than the near-perfect Wunderlich would need as Naperville Central took Game 1 of the twin bill 10-0 in six innings.

Staked to that big early lead, Wunderlich just reared back and fired strike after strike at the overpowered Tiger hitters. The Redhawks ace had 13 strikeouts and a perfect game through five innings only to have to settle for a 1-hit, 15-K performance after Plainfield North freshman Taylor Willhalm took a 1-2 pitch to lead off the sixth and lofted a soft liner over second base and into right field for the hosts’ lone hit–and lone runner–in the game.

“When you get eight runs in the first inning you just go out there with total confidence,” said Wunderlich, who came within three outs of recording the school’s first perfect game since Maureen Morris’ gem in 1989. “With an 8-0 lead it allows you to relax, throw and make your pitch.”

Tigers pitcher Erin Enk retired the first batter of the game and then Central’s Jill Anderoni dropped a bloop single to right. Kelsey Gonzalez then walked on a 3-2 pitch and when Meghan Griffin, Maddi Doane and Wunderlich each followed with RBI hits, the Redhawks were off and running. Another walk and hits by Erica Conway and Juliet Tassi – coupled with some fielding miscues by Plainfield North — and all of a sudden it was an 8-0 game.

Enk settled down and the score remained 8-0 until Griffin’s 2-run double in the sixth made the score 10-0 and gave the Redhawks’ No. 4 hitter a nice 3-for-4, 3 RBI game.

“That’s been our bugaboo all year long,” said Tigers coach Claude Ainsworth, who team dropped to 1-7 after dropping Saturday’s opener. “We give up 1 or 2 (bad) innings a game and we get behind and can’t come back.”

Ainsworth was glad to see his kids battle hard after the tough start. “After that first inning it was a 2-0 game but you can’t even give Wunderlich one or two runs,” he said.

Wunderlich, whose sister Natalie also came close to a perfect on the mound a couple years ago for the Redhawks, tried not to think about perfection as the game went on.

“I try not to think about it as much as I can,” said Wunderlich, who struck out the first 7 Tigers batters before Rion Williams popped out for the second out in the bottom of the third. “I try to make each pitch one at a time.”

If she could take one pitch back on Saturday it would be the 2-strike offering to Willhalm to open the sixth. But Redhawks coach Andy Nussbaum knows just how hard it is to throw a perfect game and he also knows one single can not erase just how dominant his pitcher was on Saturday.

“In my 28 years we’ve had one perfect game here,” said Nussbaum. “That shows you how hard it. But that (hit) doesn’t take away from an outstanding performance. She retired 15 in a row and had 15 strikeouts. That’s outstanding.”