When the softball season began, Lindsey Nance wasn’t quite sure about her knee or her head.

Both were going to play key roles in her ability to assume the pitching duties for St. Dom’s.

The junior injured her knee playing summer field hockey last summer. As if that wasn’t concern enough, she was worried about being ready mentally to step into the starting role full-time.

“It’s definitely been an adjustment,” said Nance. “Last year, I wasn’t quite mature or ready for the role. I wasn’t sure if I’d be ready to fill Jenn’s shoes this year either. Stepping into that first game, I just kind of assumed the role, and it came naturally. It just seemed to fit.”

Nance saw limited pitching action last year but has hurled the Saints to a 9-3 mark this year and done well shouldering the load. She quickly discovered that assuming the starting role wasn’t such a daunting task.

“I think you build it up to be something worse – that big monster under the bed,” she said.

Sophomore Amanda Cullen is St. Dom’s second pitcher and swings from varsity to JV, but Nance has been solid and made great improvement from last year.

“There’s more consistency in her speed,” said St. Dom’s coach Brian Kay. “Her speed has picked up. When you’re in there all the time, you’re only going to get better. She’s definitely done that.”

Nance says she feels stronger and more accurate. Even though she tore her ACL and MCL last summer, she’s been able to rebound well and make progress. It helps having a veteran group of infielders behind her. In addition to Kelsey Murphy behind the plate, she has Erynne Landry at first, Alex Landry at second, Mary Lewis at short and Heidi Nadeau at third.

“I’ve definitely been able to build confidence in myself and in my team,” said Nance. “Being able to work with them on the field and off, I have better confidence in myself and in the fact that they back me up. Even on days when I feel a little bit off, I’m not afraid to just let them hit it.”

500 Ks

Gray-New Gloucester’s ace pitcher Laura Getchell reached a significant milestone last week when she recorded her 500th career strikeout. The senior had been closing in on the mark but needed just one strikeout against Lake Region last Friday.

Getchell finished with 15 strikeouts in the 5-2 win. The Patriots are now 10-3.

The milestone is part of another successful season for Getchell, who didn’t start pitching seriously until middle school.

“I kind of kicked it into gear in seventh grade,” she said. “Our middle school didn’t have a pitcher. I knew there weren’t a lot up in high school. So I tried it, and I liked it.”

Getchell says one of her goals this year was to increase her velocity.

“I don’t really pay attention to the numbers per se,” she said. “If I feel like I’m throwing hard and it feels good than I’m like, ‘Yeah, it’s working for me.'”

Change of scenery

Moving to the Mountain Valley Conference next year should be a benefit for the St. Dom’s softball team. The Saints currently play a mixture of WMC B and C teams with a few Class D squads thrown in.

“It’ll be more consistent,” said Kay. “Right now, it is either a really weak team or a really good team. It’s hard because the pitching level is so different. We played Cape last week and the pitching level was so dominant.”

The Saints are 9-3 and ranked sixth in Western C, nestled in around a variety of MVC clubs. Though St. Dom’s has B schools like Cape, Greely and Fryeburg on its schedule, they’ve also played six games against teams that have either one win or none.

An MVC schedule should be more balanced with quality teams.

“They’re looking forward to us playing them,” said Kay, whose club lost to Georges Valley in the playoffs last spring. “We’re competitive with them every year. It’s the same way in field hockey. We always finish in the top four with those (MVC) teams, but we never play them in the regular season. We’re really looking forward to that next year.”