With two opening-round victories, the top seed and undefeated Bishop O’Connell Knights (16-0) have reached the championship game of the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference girls softball tournament.
Three-time defending champion O’Connell won both of those high-school contests on its home field at Tuckahoe Park. The Knights blanked the Bishop Ireton Cardinals, 13-0, behind 14 hits in the quarterfinals, then downed the St. Paul VI Catholic Panthers, 8-0, in the semifinals.
A couple of Arlington residents are significant contributors on the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology Colonials softball team that is enjoying a winning season.
The girls high-school squad finished the regular season with a 9-5 record.
In a seesaw girls softball game, the Yorktown Patriots eventually pulled away and defeated the host Washington-Liberty Generals in an all-Arlington neighborhood high-school clash.
Yorktown won the Liberty District contest, 20-9, after trailing by scores of 3-0, 5-2 and 9-6.
With just nine potential games remaining on its schedule, the undefeated Bishop O’Connell Knights (11-0) have no room for error in order to continue the squad’s long streak of winning 20 softball games in one season.
The girls high-school team has won 20 or more times for 30 straight spring campaigns.
The 12-under Arlington Sage girls travel softball team won the recent Crushers Smackdown tournament in Nokesville with a 5-1 record over two days.
The Sage defeated the Vienna Smash, 14-1, in the championship game of the 12B bracket.
The bats were alive and the run-scoring plentiful for the Yorktown Patriots in most of their last seven girls softball games.
Yorktown (6-7) finished 4-3 in those high-school contests, scoring double-digit runs in four of the outings and plating 58 overall.
The Bishop O’Connell Knights and Yorktown Patriots won key league games in girls softball action miles apart on April Fools’ Day — and by the same close scores.
O’Connell (8-0, 5-0) topped the host St. Mary’s Ryken Knights, 3-1, in southern Maryland in a clash between top longtime rival high-school teams in the Washington Catholic Athletic Conference.
With with a trio of convincing victories and a tight one-run win, the Bishop O’Connell Knights (7-0) extended their four-season girls softball winning streak to 61 games.
The single-run triumph was by an 8-7 score over the host St. Paul VI Catholic Panthers for the multi-time defending Division I state and Washington Catholic Athletic Conference private-school Knights.
With a couple of solid victories, the young Wakefield Warriors won their first two games of the high-school softball season.
Wakefield defeated the Edison Eagles, 6-2, then routed the Marshall Statesmen, 11-1, in home contests.
As expected, the Bishop O’Connell Knights have been enjoying a strong and dominating start to the girls high-school softball spring season.
After two games, the Knights had a 2-0 record with wins over Elizabeth Seton by an 8-1 score and Holy Cross, 14-0, in a five-inning no-hitter.
The head coaches of many high-school sports teams in Arlington have been in place for years. That is not the case, however, for the spring season in baseball and softball.
With the exception of two people, there have been a number of coaching changes in those positions recently.
Considering its vast past success over many years, lofty expectations are the case every season for the Bishop O’Connell Knights girls softball team.
Nothing will be different this spring, with the high-school squad coming off a perfect 23-0 season, owning a three-season 54-game winning streak and having won a combined 15 straight conference and private-school state-tournament championships.
