Monday, April 21, 2025
Opening with a 2-1 record after coming into a new conference, Clarke softball hopeful to continue its recent success. The Rams finished 11-11 last season, eliminated by Wantagh in the Class A semifinals.
“We lost two seniors who were All-County players last year but pretty much every other player started on varsity last year, or got playing time in some way,” said Clarke coach Alex Abanavas, who added the pitching and the bats are pretty even, but called the hitting the team’s strong suit.
“One through nine in the order can all do damage, hit the ball in the gap, potential to go home runs,” he said.
What’s interesting about the Rams’ pitching situation is that they have three arms on a given day, not just two, with all of them experienced in being starters that go deep and relievers that throw heat to get quick outs.
He’s talking about Analinda Moran, Kate Welsh and Destiny Cervantes, who all have had different pitching experiences.
“Analinda and Destiny were our two pitchers last year; last year Destiny was an eighth grader, Analinda was a freshman,” Abanavas said. “Kate, she’s coming back from ACL surgery so she missed all of last season. She’s the oldest of the three as a junior, so to get her back in addition to the two younger kids who have a lot of experience after pitching all season last year is definitely a big help.”
Facing the pitching, is an incredibly durable lineup, with some of the biggest bats coming in the middle of the lineup in Emily Diaz, Ava Porth and Leila Thakkar.
“Hitters that you want with runners on base, confident that they’re going to hit the ball hard somewhere and get the runs in,” Abanavas said. “They’re ready to hit early in counts so there’s not like any time for a pitcher to settle in, where it’s the first pitch or two strikes, they have great approaches in terms of knowing what they need to do at the plate, depending on if there’s runners on base or the situation of the game. they’re all very high IQ players.”
The lone senior is Sabrina Lee, who is currently not playing due to injury, but is on the precipice of returning to her catcher/outfielder role.
With this, the only way to go is up.
“I think our lineup has gotten better from last year, a deeper, more complete lineup,” Abanavas said. “I think that the pitching is much improved with all the experience that the kids got last year and the confidence overall of the team seems to be on a different level than it was last year.”
Something that’s keeping the team glued together is how much glue there is here in the first place.
“[Team chemistry] is something we’re doing really well with so far,” Abanavas said. “The team is all friends with each other, which is at times and underrated aspect of the team.”
