Softball is in the final push toward the postseason.
South Western is firmly in charge of Division I, but Divisions II and III are still up for grabs.
The Mustangs were unbeaten through the Easter break and sit atop the District 3 Class 6A power rankings. Senior UMBC recruit Jayda Koontz is among the league leaders with a batting average hovering around .700 and an ERA of 1.22.
She is backed by Laney Lippy, Liv Bateman, Grace Harden and Kelsey Smith, who are all hitting above .320.
Central York, Dallastown, Red Lion and New Oxford are competing for second place in Division I and spots in the district tournament. If the tournament opened today, all four would join the Mustangs in postseason play.
Ella Honaker leads Red Lion with one of the league’s top batting averages for hitters with at least 25 at-bats. She is hitting well over .600 with nearly 30 RBIs. Kennedy Fultz helps the Lions’ 1-2 punch with 15 RBIs and a batting average over .500.
Senior Ellie Lamer leads Central York with a batting average over .500.
Dallastown, which lost twice to the Mustangs in one-run games, is hanging around without a dominant hitter. Aniston Lechthaler, Peyton Keim, Jessica Norton, Zoe Roland and Braelyn Smeltzer are all hitting over .350 for the Wildcats, but no one is at .500.
Kennard-Dale and Susquehannock are leap-frogging each other in Division II, and Biglerville and Littlestown are doing the same in Division III.
The Rams rallied with a big sixth inning to defeat the Warriors 4-2 in a blustery home game on April 10.
With temperatures hanging just south of 50 degrees, a brisk breeze blowing in from the first-base line and the sky spitting drizzle, Susky starting pitcher Ella Wetzel sent a line drive to right field to score Emily Karst and Callie Shue in the top of the fifth inning. Karst reached on a triple to left field and Shue followed with a bunt single. It was the first scoring in a game that featured 11 strikeouts by Wetzel and 14 by KD’s Taryn Ashenfelter.
Addison Argiro opened the bottom of the sixth with a single to left and Ashenfelter followed with a walk. Argiro scored on a single by Lilliana Fleming. A walk to Hailey Serruto loaded the bases.
Wetzel recorded a strikeout for the first out, but Taylor Rinaudo followed with a double to left that brought in two runs and gave the Rams the lead. Rylie Fram’s sacrifice fly to right gave the Rams an insurance run.
Rinaudo, who walked and struck out in her other at-bats, said it took a little time to adjust to Wetzel’s pitching.
“It helped to get through once or twice, see her pitches,” Rinaudo said. “She’s much faster than other pitchers we see and definitely knows how to spot her pitches.”
Ashenfelter handles nearly all of the pitching duties for the Rams. And for good reason. The sophomore leads the league with a .708 ERA among pitchers with at least 20 innings pitched. She is also tops in strikeouts with a whopping 162 in 89 innings.
Wetzel has 67 innings under her belt, with 132 strikeouts and a 1.358 ERA.
Eastern York is also in the mix for the Division II lead. The Knights lost once to Susky (4-2) and KD (1-0) and have one game remaining against each one.
Littlestown and Biglerville split their regular-season meetings with the Canners winning 7-6 on March 24 and the Bolts taking the rematch 14-3 on April 16.
Alexis Stonesifer, one of three pitchers registering at least 15 innings for Littlestown, picked up the win on that blustery April day. The sophomore gave up five hits and struck out four in five innings of work.
After allowing a single in the top of the first, her teammates gave her nine runs to work with in the bottom of the inning. That cushion made the conditions a little better to manage.
“It was a lot more difficult to find my spots,” Stonesifer said of the 20-plus mph gusts that swept across the field from the third-base side. “It slowed my speed a drastic amount. And it moved the ball when I tried to go inside on the right-handers.”
Stonesifer helped her cause by going 2-for-2 at the plate with a triple and 2 RBIs. Sarah Loveless also had a triple in 2-for-3 hitting and drove in three runs.
Adyson Popoff bombed a shot over the fence in left-center field and drove in two runs.
Stonesifer, Loveless and Popoff are among the league hitting leaders with at least 20 plate appearances, hitting at .707, .659 and .609, respectively.
Fairfield’s Maddy Payne has the hottest bat in the league. She is hitting at a .742 clip with 31 at-bats. She has recorded 18 singles and 5 doubles.
Stonesifer also sits among the league pitching leaders with a .778 ERA in 18 innings pitched. Maddy Dubbert has pitched 20.2 innings for the Bolts with a 1.355 ERA.
Sydney McCleaf has handled most of the pitching duties for Biglerville, going 51 innings with a 3.980 ERA.
That Biglerville jumped out to a 5-0 start is pretty remarkable considering that five of their 12 varsity players missed the first week of practice while they wrapped up their basketball season.
District 3 hopefuls
Here is a look at the teams who are in the running for qualifying for the District 3 tournament in each class (through games played April 21).
Class A (two teams qualify): York Catholic is No. 1 in the power rankings at 3-7.
Class 2A (four teams qualify): Delone Catholic (5-8) is No. 1 and Fairfield (6-6) is at No. 3.
Class 3A (eight teams qualify): Littlestown (10-3) is at No. 6 and Biglerville (7-4) is at No. 9.
Class 4A (eight teams qualify): Kennard-Dale (13-1) is at No. 2 and Eastern York (8-4) is at No. 8.
Class 5A (14 teams qualify): Susquehannock (8-3) and New Oxford (8-6) sit at Nos. 11 and 12.
Class 6A (14 teams qualify): South Western (11-0) sits atop the class and is followed by Central York (8-4) at No. 5, Red Lion (9-4) at No. 9 and Dallastown (7-6) at No. 11.
Shelly Stallsmith covers York-Adams high school sports for GameTimePA and the USAToday Network. Connect with her by email mstallsmith@ydr.com or on X, formerly Twitter, @ShelStallsmith.
This article originally appeared on York Daily Record: YAIAA softball: Division titles, district spots up for grabs