CLOQUET — Superior ace pitcher Haley Zembo notched her second no-hitter in a three-day span and third no-hitter overall for the season as the Spartans rolled to a 18-0 triumph over Cloquet, Wednesday, May 3, at Braun Park.
The Winona State signee, who entered the game with a 0.33 ERA in six starts, fanned nine Lumberjacks over the four-inning contest en route to extending the Spartans’ unbeaten streak to 11 games to begin the season.
Head coach Mike Sather pointed to Zembo’s whiff-inducing mix of rise ball and off-speed pitches as the key to her success in the circle, before going on to acknowledge the team’s sharp fielding behind her, which included zero errors.
“Sooner or later somebody’s going to put a bat on it, and if you don’t have to pitch with bases loaded all the time and they’re getting outs for you, it’s a lot easier,” Sather said.
Zembo took her first steps into the circle with a three-run lead in-hand in the bottom of the first after the Spartans capitalized on a pair of passed balls and the first of eight errors by Cloquet in the loss.
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In spite of the challenges that the team has faced this week in the wake of a lopsided loss at the hands of Rock Ridge on Monday, Lumberjacks’ head coach Tyler Korby is confident in his team's ability to get back on track before the start of the postseason.
“We just have to continue to make the routine plays that are at us and throw strikes, and we’re going to be just fine,” Korby said. “These girls are hard-nosed players. They love to play, and we’ve seen some challenges lately, and we’re doing our best to get prepared for the playoffs…We’re just trying to take a little bit each and every day to get better.”
After being held without a hit by starting pitcher Allie Jones in the first two innings, the Spartans flexed their muscles at the plate with a 12-hit, 13-run explosion punctuated by a grand slam blast off the bat of Emma Raye to score Alayna DeGraef, Avery Visger and Paige Johnson, who all reached on base hits.
Superior as a team finished the game with 15 hits from eight different batters. Emma Raye and Indigo Fish led the way with three hits each, while Ari Robillard, Keira Corbett and DeGraef each added two.
“The hitting was outstanding today, which you can’t always rely on. Some days it’s terrible, some days it’s great, so that’s up and down,” Sather said. “(It was) just one of those days where they all hit. Usually it’s just one person, today it was all nine of them, so fortunate for us.”
The incredible hitting display and overall performance drew high praise from Korby.
“That’s the best high school softball team I’ve ever seen,” he said. “They’re strong up and down the lineup. They throw strikes, make plays. They’ve got speed. They’ve got power. They take the ball where it’s pitched. They hit the gaps. They’ve got a chance to win that Wisconsin state title and that would be pretty cool if they do that. I ain’t betting against them.”
The Spartans closed out the game with two more runs in the top half of the fourth via an error in the outfield and a sacrifice fly by Corbett to drive in the 17th and 18th runs.
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Cloquet (5-2) will be back in action on Monday, May 8, when the team travels to Barnum to take on the Bombers at 4 p.m. Superior (11-0) will take the field Thursday to host Duluth Marshall at 4:30 p.m.
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