Katy advances past surging Cinco into regional semi's

By Tyler Tyre, Sports Editor
Posted 5/13/22

“Everyone is backing each other up,” Reichardt said. Everyone is working for each other and its awesome to see. Pitchers are working for our hitters, hitters are doing the same for our pitchers and it allows everyone to be relaxed out there and not be as tight.”

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Katy advances past surging Cinco into regional semi's

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Katy kept reminding itself all week not to take Cinco Ranch lightly.

The Tigers swept the Cougars in district with two run rule wins, but they knew things wouldn’t be as easy in the regional quarterfinal round.

Katy made sure they didn’t underestimate the Cougars, and it paid off, with the Tigers sweeping their regional quarterfinal series two games to zero with a 7-2 win in game one and a 10-0 game in game two.

“We knew coming into this series that there couldn’t be any underestimating them, we just couldn’t,” said sophomore Ashtyn Reichardt. “They had been playing really well and we knew this was a different level of team we were playing. They came in fired up so we just felt like we needed to come in even better and play up to our competition. We worked all week and knew what our goals were, and we just really came through when we needed to.”

A big part of the Tigers success came from their pitching, as they allowed just two runs over the course of the series and no runs in game two. Lauryn Soeken picked up the win on the mound in a dominant performance where she allowed only two hits in five innings while striking out four. But the Tigers offense was working too, as they scored in every inning.

“Everyone is backing each other up,” Reichardt said. Everyone is working for each other and its awesome to see. Pitchers are working for our hitters, hitters are doing the same for our pitchers and it allows everyone to be relaxed out there and not be as tight.”

Katy took the lead in the first inning on a Montgomery Henderson double and doubled it the next inning when Soeken hit a sacrifice grounder. The Tigers continued to slowly build their lead in the third with a home run from Kailey Wyckoff, before they put together a two run inning in the fourth with an RBI single from Ashlee Piraneo and an RBI single from Wyckoff to make it 5-0.

“Tonight was a really good example of what we need to do to win games,” said Katy head coach Kalum Kaack. “I told them at the end that that was really big to get runs every inning. What it tells you is through the whole lineup, somebody is getting on base, someone is moving them in scoring position and then someone is coming up clutch hits, whether it’s the top or the bottom of the order. They all did it, when you can your whole batting order playing like that, it takes so much pressure off of other areas and let you play relaxed.”

Katy got one more run in the fifth on a single from Cameryn Harrison, and then had a big inning in the sixth, with Erynne Castillo driving in a run on a single and Reichardt ending things with a three-run double to secure the run rule win and the series.

“We were able to make adjustments early and pick what pitches we wanted to go after,” Reichardt said. “That let us just be comfortable and it paid off for us, it was fun to see everyone come through.”

Katy advances to play Pearland in the regional semifinals, the Oilers also come off of a two games to none sweep in their regional quarterfinal series against Clear Springs.

“We just have to continue to do the hard work in practice and not focus on anything but the task ahead of us,” Haack said. “We focus a lot on leadership and we want to produce good leaders. They’ve been doing a really good job of holding everyone accountable and being those leaders on and off the field, we just have to keep doing that.”

Katy ISD, sports, softball, Katy, playoffs, Cinco Ranch