The Highline Pirates scored some offense on a solo shot from Randi Dry, connecting on a change-up off Kennedy ace pitcher Karli Merlich. So did the Pirates beat the Lancers by one?

Oh no. Oh noooo. Merlich pitched a gem besides that, allowing no other hits, and the Lancers continued to roll in the Seamount League, undefeated with an 11-0 record now, after having downed the Pirates, 11-1, in a quick 10-run rule shortened fastpitch game at Chelsea Park Friday.

"Karli is a great pitcher," said JFK coach Dino Josie.

The Lancers are a very good 3A classification team. Their only loss is to 4A Rogers, 8-1, in a preseason tournament. And, also, the Lancers did beat another South Puget Sound League team, Kentwood, 2-0, who, by the way, is currently second in their league standings.

Merlich is very good though, as Josie pointed out. She is 8-0, and it is naive not to say pitching is the biggest deal in fastpitch between two good teams battling it out. So, Merlich makes a difference with the Lancers' defense playing a lot of error free games in addition to having eight shutouts thus far this season. The Lancers have scored 120 runs and allowed only six runs.

The Mount Rainier Rams have actually scored six more runs than the Lancers offensively this season accumulative, but, defensively, the Rams have allowed 56 runs to cross home plate. What's more, the Rams are in second place in the league, having lost, 6-0, to the Lancers on April 17 and also a loss to Lindbergh.

The Lancers have been to state the last two years, having done well last year there. They won one, lost one, won one, lost one, captain and catcher, Deavonnie Spadoni, otherwise known as "Dew," recalled.

"We lost three players, and I was wondering at first what we would do, but the season has fell into place," said Spadoni.

"The nice thing is that when we do make a mistake we can come back," said Josie. "We have a catcher who can throw them out stealing second, the girls just come back to make the next play."

Dew is a rock-solid backstop and catcher, and is the secret to the "offensive success," as Josie put it.

"I think our secret to our offensive success is Mike Trautmann and Jim Perkins," said Josie of his two assistant coaches. "They throw batting practice to the girls every day so the girls get live pitching thrown at them."

So it's no secret the Lancers have a super pitcher, a great defense, and a run-scoring offense.

"They are aggressive at the plate and good things happen off that," said Josie. "We don't go up looking for a walk, the ball is a-flyin' to the outfield and thru the infield."

The ball was doing just that against the Pirates, half a dozen hits sprayed out in only five innings, and the Lancers scored runs in the first, second, third and fourth. Errors too were contributory to the Pirates' loss, but the hits came, too.

The Lancers have scored a lot of runs this season without the benefit of their opposition creating errors and with the honor of having shown good offense. But, yes, especially early on, in this game versus the opposition, starting out it was the Pirates' self-destuction early that set the stage for this blowout. The Pirates had three errors in the first inning and it led to a 4-0 Lancers lead.

Nothing really changed after that except hitting took over for errors, as Peggy Mathison zipped around the bases for a home run to lead things off and Maggie Whaley and Merlich singled in runs, too. Then in the third, Malissa Kinimaka ripped a triple over a backpedaling Pirates center fielder who got a mitt on the ball even. But that ball was hit so hard that it caromed off and went farther into the outfield behind her.

Kinimaka was at third until the next batter, Shelly Donohoe, singled her in.

In the fifth, Mathison tripled, just about homering again, but Josie wisely held her up at third as she wanted to be told to be able to round the bag and go for homer number two on the night. Donohoe came to the plate a batter or two later and did a nice drag hit (swinging the bat and running in motion at the same time). Then Mathison collected an RBI single and Merlich blasted a two-run hit for her second hit of the afternoon. The smoke cleared on this game about after Amanda Clark singled in one more run in this same fifth inning and it was over after that.