Locked in another pitchers' duel, Janée Williams delivered her best performance of the postseason against the top-ranked team in Delaware, shutting out Caravel Academy in eight innings to win Milford High School its first softball championship since 1976, 2-0.
"It's amazing," Williams said.
The Bucs needed that shutout to have a chance, because for all of regulation, Caravel's pitching was just as good. Milford didn't score its runs until the eighth inning, and until that rally all of their baserunners had come on walks, fielding errors and one hit batter.
Shortstop Nikki Parsley, Milford's spark plug all season, was the one who finally broke that no-hitter when she sent a pitch up the first-base line to lead off the eighth.
"It felt absolutely awesome," Parsley said. "I train for that every day...we've been working for this for so long, and our group of girls have always believed that we're good enough to win a championship."
After she stole second and second baseman Amber Andrews drew a walk, third baseman Morgan Culver hit a sacrifice grounder to move them to second and third, and first baseman Marcy McKee dropped a base hit into the second-base gap to plate both runners, giving Milford the 2-0 lead.
"I was nervous when I went to the plate, but I just tried to send the ball up the middle," McKee said. "It's amazing. Just an amazing experience."
The next batter, center fielder Savannah Becker, grounded out to end the inning, but Williams took the final Caravel batters down 1-2-3 to seal the win.
It was a pitchers' duel the whole way; Williams answered Caravel pitcher Cara Stecher's effort by carrying her own no-hitter into the fifth before giving up a two-out single, and ended up allowing two hits and two walks on the day. She pitched all 30 innings of postseason play for the Bucs, giving up just three total runs.
"I looked at it as another normal game," Williams said."I didn't want to feel any pressure about a championship."
Williams was pitching her third game in four days, after holding Sussex Tech and Sussex Central to one run each on May 27 and 28. She said the work had her exhausted by the middle of the Caravel game, but it didn't show.
"She never slowed down. Not once," said catcher Morgan McKenzie, who has caught for Williams since they were both in middle school.
Even during a rough streak in the fourth and fifth innings when she didn't get a single called strike in six at-bats, Williams got Caravel batters to swing at bad pitches for easy pop-ups and ground-outs.
"Quality, quality pitching. Good, solid defense," Head Coach Charles Darling said. "We made just about every one of the routine plays today, and that's what you need to do to win in softball."
Beating the top-ranked team in the tournament finished a run of four straight upsets for the Bucs, over seventh-ranked Smyrna, third-ranked Central and second-rank Tech. Milford was the tournament's tenth seed, and finished the regular season second in the Henlopen South division to Indian River.
"If you're going to do it, you might as well do it against the best," McKee said.
The Bucs didn't always look like a championship team - they were 6-5 at one point and lost to both Tech and Central in the regular season before beating them in tournament play.
"The last two weeks, things started to smooth out," Darling said. "Our assistant coaches are the key--they are totally responsible for bringing a group of talented players together as a talented team."
"We are definitely a changed team," left fielder Alyssa Saunders said.
