The best-laid plans, as it were, may aft gang agley, though not East End Land Planning’s, at least when it comes to the East Hampton Town women’s slow-pitch softball playoff trophy, which Katie Osiecki’s team has now won three years in a row.
The Planners, who began their playoff run four years ago, losing in 2019’s final to Groundworks, battered the East Hampton Town P.B.A. 19-2 at the Terry King ball field in Amagansett on Aug. 8, thus sweeping the best-of-three series. The Planners had defeated the P.B.A. 12-8 in game one.
It didn’t take E.E.L.P. long to assault the P.B.A., and it wasn’t just the battery (Osiecki being the pitcher, and Kim Havlic the catcher) -- all but two in the lineup that night got at least one hit. It was all over after four innings thanks to the mercy rule.
The Planners’ Kaci Koehne led off the top of the first inning with a double to left-center field, after which she scored when Laura Kearney, P.B.A.’s second baseman, bobbled the grounder Kathy Sarlo hit her way. Mylan Eckardt followed with a single and Osiecki flied out to left. Thea Grenci then hit into a 6-5 force, and Havlic grounded softly toward T. Schirrippa, P.B.A.’s pitcher, who, in going for a force at third, overthrew Tara Fordham, which allowed Sarlo to cross the plate with E.E.L.P.’s second run. Nicole Fierro, P.B.A.’s shortstop, gunned out Khara Struble to end the inning.
The P.B.A. tied it up in its half, with Schirrippa and Fierro getting the r.b.i.s. East End Land Planning wrested the lead back at 3-2 in the top of the second, a run coming home when Alyssa Brabant, with one out and runners at the corners, grounded into a force at second.
Osiecki held the P.B.A. scoreless in the bottom of the second, after which the Planners went to work in the third. After Sarlo and Eckardt had singled back-to-back, Osiecki, the cleanup hitter, homered to deep left field, treating E.E.L.P. to a 6-2 lead.
And there was more to come. Grenci reached first base safely on a popup that landed unclaimed, and Havlic’s fly ball was caught in left field for the first out, but Struble, Shelley Bobek, and Robin Helgerson followed with base hits, Helgerson’s accounting for two more runs. The Planners loaded the bases again when Fordham couldn’t hold on to a soft throw from Fierro that would have forced a runner there, and, with the bases loaded yet again, Brabant came through with a two-run single for a 10-2 lead.
Koehne, Eckardt, and Osiecki tacked on r.b.i.s before the 10-run, 10-hit inning ended on a popup to third by Grenci.
Schirrippa and Fierro singled back-to-back in the bottom of the third, but were stranded at first and second base when Emma Terry, Kearney, and Tara Gurney were successively shut down by Osiecki.
The Planners put the finishing touches to the rout in the top of the fourth, a six-run, five-hit inning during which Sarlo hit a three-run homer and Eckardt tripled.
Mercifully, the game was called after the P.B.A. went down in order in its last at-bat.
