Poly Prep’s Kerri Saputo slides into home plate safely. (An Rong Xu)
Poly Prep’s Ciara Schirripa is determined to make up for lost time.
The sophomore pitcher is striving for a great year after a stress fracture in her back sidelined her for almost all of her freshman season.
Schirripa was solid in aiding the defending NYSAISAA champion Blue Devils to a 5-3 victory over Riverdale in Ivy Prep League softball in Brooklyn on Saturday. Schirripa pitched a complete game while giving up three runs on six hits and striking out seven.
“I couldn’t just come back and give them what I had before,” Schirripa said. “I had to make sure I was stronger and I am. I had to come and give them 150 percent of what I had.”
Schirripa, the daughter of former Sopranos star Steve Schirripa, gave up three runs over the first two innings, but was solid the rest of the way. The Blue Devils trailed 3-2 until the bats came to life for a two-out rally in the third inning. With two outs and nobody on, Breanna Sarrubi hit a single to center off Riverdale pitcher Nicole Cornet and then stole second. Jacquie Kennedy then drove her in as the tying run on a base hit and came around to score when Kerri Saputo hit a single to leftfield that was misplayed by Rosemary Leahey. Saputo then scored on an error by Sarah Ben Ezra to cap the three-run inning.
Kennedy drove in the tying run before scoring what eventually proved to be the game-winning run and went 2-for-3 with two singles.
“We knew it was gonna be a tough go,” Kennedy said. “Our warmup put us in the mindset to keep the energy up and it stayed throughout the entire game and we didn’t let it go. Ciara has been stepping up.”
The game didn’t start off too well for Poly Prep as Riverdale was able to scratch across one run in the first inning on an RBI double by Harlie Silver and then added two runs in the top of the second on a double by Ben Ezra with the bases loaded. On the double, Madison Kahn tried to score from first, but leftfielder Claire Regan fired the ball to shortstop Lindsay Holcomb who gunned out Kahn at the plate on a bang-bang play.
Trailing 3-0 in the bottom of the second, Poly Prep took advantage of sloppy defensive plays by Riverdale. After Amanda Schnell and Leahey both dropped fly balls on back-to-back plays, Lauren Klehammer dropped down a bunt that scored Saputo and Regan then hit an RBI double that plated Lily Seibert to cut Poly Prep’s deficit to 3-2.
“We had too many errors,” Riverdale head coach Sue Fleming said. “A team like Poly, you can’t give them that or they’re gonna capitalize and that’s what they did.”
Cornet got the loss for Riverdale and lasted four innings while striking out three and giving up five runs, two earned, on four hits. Kahn then took over and pitched two scoreless innings in relief. After Schirripa was staked to a 5-3 lead, she cruised to victory.
It was a hard-fought victory for Poly Prep, and Schirripa will hope to continue her success after missing all but two innings last season.
“Ciara’s been improving every game,” Poly Prep coach Mildred Piscopo said. “She gets stronger with every start.”