With the mercurial play, the team’s overall record of 14-10, 8-6 in the Missota Conference, paints an accurate picture of the 2009 campaign.

Coach Heather Ballstadt summed up her fourth season on the job succinctly. “We were inconsistent all year,” she said.

Ballstadt awarded 15 varsity letters and three certificates of participation to team members at the post-season awards banquet.

Letterwinners included seniors Sarah Gunderson, Sydney Silk, Kirstee Rotty, Amanda Karppi and Amanda Kepler; juniors Brittany Zuther, Shannon Doherty, Kristy Ternes, Sam Jensen, Brianna Heikkila, Megan Nekowitsch and Kelsey Betzold; sophomore Dani Muelken; freshman Ali Rice and eighth-grader Ashley Betzold.

Amanda Verch, Paige Linrud and Katy Lindin received certificates of participation.

Jensen, who led the metro area in hitting (.575) for the second straight season, joined Gunderson and Doherty on the all-Missota Conference team. Jensen also landed a spot on the all-section and all-metro teams and also made the all-state second squad.

Karppi won all-section honors and along with Rotty received all-conference honorable mention. Gunderson played in the Coaches Association All-Star game and received all-state honorable mention.

Team awards went to Muelken (Most Improved); Gunderson (Golden Glove) and Silk (Team Player).

Ballstadt noted that her team put together some big wins this season, including a 6-5 thriller over Prior Lake that snapped the Lakers 12-game winning streak and a 2-1 showing (third place) in the talent-rich Benilde-St. Margaret’s tournament.

“It was nice seeing so many different players step to the plate and come up with big hits at different times,” she said, “and I thought we did a good job of playing through a lot of injuries.

Ballstadt offered that the most frustrating thing about the season may have been three consecutive losses to Northfield, the last in the team’s final game of the section tourney.

“They had a good ball club this year,” she said, “But every very time we played them we had too many errors.”

Ballstadt said she will miss the presence of the five senior starters next spring but is hopeful the returnees and the addition of some talent from the successful B-squad team will propel the Tigers back up the conference standings.

“Ashley Betzold learned a lot of about pitching at this level in the varsity games she threw this year,” she said, “and she will be playing this summer so I know she will keep improving.

“We will have to come together at the beginning of the season and fill some big shoes left by this year’s seniors.”

Statisicial leaders

Hitting
Sam Jensen .575
Sarah Gunderson .400
Kelsey Betzold .338

Hits
Jensen 46
Gunderson 26
Shannon Doherty 23

Runs
Jensen 29
Doherty 19
Gunderson 18

Runs batted in
Gunderson 16
Jensen 15
Betzold 11

Pitching/ERA
Amanda Karppi 12-7: 2.0
Ashley Betzold 2-4: 3.0

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