Girls’ Softball Cruises to 15-0 Victory Over Roselle

Freshman pitcher Julie Siragusa continued her impressive varsity campaign, tossing a perfect three innings while striking out every batter she faced, as the Lady Cougars rolled past Roselle Friday by a final of 15-0 at Adams Avenue field in Cranford.

The top-ranked team in the county followed up their 6-0 whitewash of Union Catholic Thursday with another blank slate as they improve to 14-2 on the season.

Cranford scored seven runs in the first and eight in the second before the game was called after two-and-a-half innings of play.

"I feel that every time you get between the two white lines, it's business," said Siragusa, the ninth-grade southpaw. "You have to play your best every time, and whatever happens, happens. I think this year we'll be pretty successful with Kelly (Hardman) on the mound, our hitting and good defense."

"Everybody did well, everybody hit well, we got the runs that we needed to score, but we can never take a team for granted," said senior Kelly Hardman. "You never know if they're going to come out better than us if we don't have the enthusiasm. So we just have to take it day by day."

Siragusa also came through with the stick, pounding out two hits and four RBI's with two runs scored. Hardman, Katie Bradford, Taylor D'Antico, Nicole Ravetier, Steph Bagniewski and Jessica McCoy each had a base hit in the contest.

Still, it's been Siragusa's fastball that's been getting a lot of attention.

"I feel like I've been getting better," said Siragusa. "I have Kelly and Coach Rick to push me and move me along. The Governor Livingston game was probably one of my most successful games all year, I did pretty well. I think now that we're in the counties, there will be a little more pressure. But we've got it under control."

The conference crown will be on the line in the next few weeks, with Cranford battling with Governor Livingston for the title.

"Conference is always important," said Hardman. "We've won it the last three or four years, so it's nice to get it under your belt, then we can work on counties and hopefully we'll get states."