With the score deadlocked at 0-0 in the second inning, Sidney Holder ’17 stepped up to the plate and slugged a home run against North Reading High School on Saturday. Holder opened the scoring for Andover en route to a gritty 3-0 win in the first half of its doubleheader.
Andover could not capitalize on its momentum, however, and fell 16-11 in the second game of the doubleheader against North Reading. The team’s record now stands at 5-2.
Andover’s defensive effort spearheaded the shutout win in the first half. Co-Captain Kristina Haghdan ’17 pitched all seven innings in the first game, clinching a shutout and striking out seven of the first eight batters. In total, Haghdan struck out fourteen batters.
Head Coach Peter Drench said, “In the first game, our greatest strength was pitching. Kristina Haghdan tossed a one-hit shutout, striking out 14, walking none. She also went two-for-four in the leadoff spot in our batting order. ”
Co-Captain Victoria Bergeron ’16 said, “I think in the first game we played good defense and that was represented in our score; we shut them out.”
Alongside Holder, Hillary Dole ’17 also hit a home run to provide an offensive spark in an otherwise defensively dominated game.
In the second game, however, both teams’ offenses exploded with a 16-11 final scoreline. Andover scored at least one run in each of the first five innings, but in the end could not match North Reading’s 16 runs.
Margaret Bragdon ’18 stepped up to the mound in the second game against North Reading, pitching all seven innings. Due to errors in the outfield, Andover was unable to defensively match its strong offensive performance.
Drench said, “In the end, our unusually poor defensive performance proved too big a problem to overcome, but it was encouraging to see that the team had managed to fight its way back into the game several times. Had we played up to our capability in the field, the outcome would’ve been different.”
Bergeron said, “Unfortunately in our second game, I think that our defense was our weak point. Our offense did come alive in the second game, which was good because we fell short in a lot of our at bats in the first game, but we were able to come back from that and make the adjustments that we needed to make, and we hit well in the second game. Combining the good aspects of both games is also what we want to focus on going forward.”
Andover will host BB&N and Tabor Academy on Saturday.
