What a career capper for Astuto
STATE COLLEGE – Canon-McMillan softball coach Michele Moeller remembers working with pitcher Alayna Astuto when the latter was 8 years old.
A sign that Astuto would one day win a PIAA title by flirting with a no-hitter and striking out 18? Not quite.
“When I first saw Alayna, I thought, ‘My God, she can’t even balance.'” Moeller explained. “I said to her, ‘You need to go walk curbs.'”
Astuto must’ve walked a few curbs, one of Moeller’s preferred forms of instruction for young pitchers.
She’s improved quite a bit as a pitcher, too.
And it’s that development – not only over the past few years but even from the regular season to the postseason – that was one of the primary reasons Canon-McMillan (25-1) was able to outlast Neshaminy, 4-3, in 12 innings Friday to win the program’s first state title.
Moeller brought a group of 10-and-under players from the Canonsburg Lady Knights and heard feedback from one parent saying that the players had watched Astuto’s demeanor in the circle and couldn’t believe how calm she remained.
“Every time she walked out, she took a deep, cleansing breath and cleared her head,” Moeller said. “That comes from experience. When she was younger, she didn’t do that stuff.
“They watched her and saw how she calmly walks back, takes a breath, doesn’t rush into the pitch. Our younger kids learned from watching her as well.”
Astuto was excellent during the regular season, but she turned dominant in seven postseason games, allowing seven runs in 54 innings. She struck out 54 and only walked five.
“Just working on hitting my spots and finding the batters’ weaknesses,” Astuto said. “Just have to keep strong.”
On Friday, realizing Neshaminy (23-3) had a bunch of aggressive hitters, Astuto relied on her changeup more.
She got plenty of goofy swings, and a third of her strikeout total came with the batter looking.
“We knew they were going to be very eager at the plate,” Astuto said. “We were just trying to throw that in there to get them out in front of it.”
Credit pitching coach Bob Gneuhs for refining Astuto’s mechanics and Moeller for handling the psychological part. Brian Kiger calls the pitches.
“I have younger pitchers now and the parents say, ‘Do you think she can pitch?’ I say, ‘Listen, you don’t know what a kid is going to turn into,'” Moeller said. “I didn’t know Alayna was going to turn into what she was going to turn into. You just have to encourage them. If they’re willing to work hard, you never know what will happen.”
Sick about it
Catcher Giorgiana Zeremenko has been battling a stomach bug since the PIAA Class AAAA semifinals and needed several water breaks yesterday to ensure that she didn’t … um, render the batter’s box unusable.
Figure that a 12-inning, near-three-hour game didn’t help things much.
“What a game. You couldn’t get any better,” Moeller said. “I walked up to Giorgiana one at-bat and said, ‘It doesn’t get any better than this.’ She said, ‘I’m getting a little tired coach.'”
Looks like it works
Olivia Lorusso’s putout at home in the 10th inning was a product of what Moeller called sequential practices, something she picked up from a coaching clinic at Hofstra.
It’s essentially going heavy on in-game situations, and this happened to be one of the situations – the third baseman fielding a bunt and throwing home – the Big Macs have covered quite a bit recently.
“That’s one of them, and (Lorusso) executed,” Moeller said. “It’s up to them to execute.”
Rarified air
Canon-McMillan became the first school since Class AAAA was adopted in 2005 to win both baseball and softball titles. The baseball team did it in 2008.