At the end, it was a little weird, but in the big picture it was all good for the University of Hawaii-Hilo softball team following an unusual season-ending doubleheader Saturday against Hawaii Pacific. ADVERTISING At the end, it was a
At the end, it was a little weird, but in the big picture it was all good for the University of Hawaii-Hilo softball team following an unusual season-ending doubleheader Saturday against Hawaii Pacific.
Eight-ranked in the region and hoping to receive a postseason tournament berth next week, the Vulcans were hoping for a sweep against the Sharks and were headed in that direction after a 10th inning rally lifted them to a 4-2 victory in the first game behind Emily Greene’s first home run of the day and the solid pitching of Vanessa Salinas.
The second game was called when darkness fell after nine innings with the score tied 5-5.
Officially, it goes into the record books as a halted game that will not be played to a conclusion. It is not a tie, but the individual stats will count.
“Yeah, that’s a little weird but I think this was a good day for us, not as good as our wildest hopes, but not bad, for sure,” said first-year UHH coach Peejay Brun. “To get to the playoffs we wanted two wins, obviously, but give HPU credit, they played great today.”
Both teams played well for the most part, but Emily Greene was a standout for the Vulcans with three home runs, two in the halted second game.
As it was, the Sharks were the only team that bit into UHH at the end of the season, their doubleheader split a couple weeks back was the only game of the final 10 that the Vulcans lost. UH-Hilo is 31-16 and 20-10 in the Pacific West Conference, HPU finished 24-21 and 14-15 in conference play.
Whether this was the end of the season or just the regular season remains to be seen, but in either case, it can only be considered a success for a team with a first-year coach that started the season with only 13 players on the roster.
“It is the most amazing team I’ve ever coached, ever been associated with,” Brun said. “As coaches, we always have ideas, concepts for our teams that we think can work but you never know about the buy-in form the players; will they see the point? Will they commit? They welcomed everything we did, they jumped in and competed and pulled together like nothing I’ve seen.”
For a first year experiment, 31 wins is probably well above the expected standard.
“Honestly,” Brun said, “right after the season started I had a feeling we could win 30 games this year. I didn’t tell anybody, but I definitely had that feeling. Maybe not everybody expected it early on, but this team proved itself, over and over.”
Greene, a senior who has had two-home run games this season, added another of those with a brace of home runs in the second game. She finished the day with three home runs and four RBI. She led the team with nine home runs this season.
Senior Vanessa Salinas pitched her last home game for the Vulcans in the first game win, finishing the regular season with a 18-8 record after scattering six hits, allowing one run and striking out eight while not walking a batter.
She ends the first game with a two-run homer in the 10th.
