By Megan Kelley

Review Writer

The Lake Orion High School varsity softball team is on a two-week winning streak coming off of a big win at a tournament in Petosky over the weekend.

The Dragons are headed into a big week for league play taking on Farmington High School on Tuesday night after Review Press Time and play the Oxford Wildcats on Friday before heading to a tournament in Owasso this weekend.

Despite being relatively young, the team consisting of four seniors, four juniors, seven sophomores and three freshmen currently holds the top spot in the league.

“I’d have to say we’re one of the top teams, I would hope. Even though our starting lineup is pretty young, we start a couple of seniors and then usually five sophomores and maybe a freshman. So, we haven’t settled in on our best starting lineup yet. I always tell the girls that, once we pick our team, the starting lineup on the first game is not the starting lineup when we start districts. It kind of evolves and some girls work their way into the lineup just by showing us what they can do and everything,” said head coach Joe Woityra. “I think we stack up pretty good against the other teams. It’s just a matter of out girls playing how they can play and I’m pretty happy with that.”

The district tournament is set to take place on June 4 where Lake Orion will take on Waterford Kettering at noon. Should the Dragons claim victory, they will take on the winner of the Clarkston/Oxford game which takes place earlier in the day.

“You always want to win. We play Kettering at noon and Clarkston plays Oxford at 10 (a.m.) and the finals is at 2 (p.m.) between the two winners. So, Clarkston we’ve played them twice and they’ve got a good team we played well enough to beat them both games but you can’t look past anybody,” said Woityra. “Last year, we got beat by Stoney in Districts and obviously the dynamics have changed because of the teams that are in our district this year but still, our goal is always to win Districts and get to Regionals and once you get there, you’re only less than a handful of games away from the finals. We have good pitching; we have good hitting. Our fielding has been much better than last year. Our girls have matured, they’re one year older, one year stronger and that’s always a positive.”

Last year was the first season back after the cancelation of the 2019-2020 season. While the 2020-21 season certainly had its difficulties, it has also set up the Dragons for a better season this year.

“The COVID mis-season and everything kind of screwed things up for last year. It was kind of like starting from scratch and this year, the girls have all played for us, a lot of them for a year. So, it’s smoother, very much smoother I’d say, Woityra said. “We know the girls better. Last year was kind of weird because we had a huge graduating class the year before COVID and then we had the COVID year where we didn’t have a team at all or a season and then last year was very strange for us because I like to know the kids that are coming in and stuff. So, this year was kind of, I don’t want to say easy but, it was just a smoother transition from year to year, last year to this year.”

Lake Orion’s girls varsity softball team is a traditionally very good team that regularly has a winning record and progresses relatively far in both the District and Regional tournaments.

“Fundamentally, we’re strong. In softball, it’s pitching and defense and if you can hit really well, that’s a bonus. We started a little slow hitting this year and we’re kind of hitting our stride right now – hitting quite well. We’ve probably got seven or eight girls that are hitting 400 or better right now, and our fielding, we’ve cut our errors probably in half at this point,” Woityra said. “And our pitching is going well. We have a senior who is 10-3 and a freshman that’s 5-2. It’s coming together, I mean we do have our bad days but we have a lot of good days so as long as we keep growing and learning, I’m pretty happy with that.”

Some key players for the Dragons this year are senior outfielder Brooke Schoenberg (hitting a 405 with 17 RBI’s and 40 runs scored), sophomore utility player Madi Eckert (hitting 527 with 22 RBI’s), junior outfielder Avery Case (hitting 490 with 21 RBI’s), junior catcher Sophie Stironek (hitting 446 with 17 RBI’s and 24 runs scored) and senior pitcher Shannon Mosesso. (pitching 10-3).

The ladies are back in action on Friday, hitting the road to take on the Wildcats at Oxford High School.