Kee softball team rips through three regional games to earn State berth
Kee eighth grade pitcher Kendra Cooper (#10) is swarmed by her teammates at home plate after crushing the first of two home runs she blasted in the Hawks’ Class 1A Region 2 championship triumph, 12-0 in five innings, over 12th-ranked Mason City Newman Monday, July 14 at Cresco. Cooper was four-for-four at the plate in the contest with a single, a double and a three-run and solo round-tripper to drive in six RBI and score four runs while also throwing a two-hit shut-out at Newman with seven strike-outs. View and find out how to purchase this photo and much more by clicking on the “Photo Galleries” link.
It’s happened just once before in program history, but never in such dominating fashion.
The Kee softball team mastered its way through three regional tournament games this past week by a scoring margin of 35-1 to earn just the second State Tournament berth in program history, the Hawks last making a trip to Fort Dodge during the 2002 season, placing sixth among that year’s Class 1A elite. Kee first blasted Central Elkader, 12-0 in three innings, Wednesday, July 9 before handing Turkey Valley an 11-1 rout Friday, July 11, both of those games played on Kee’s home field. The culmination of that eye-opening tournament run, however, was another 12-0 Kee pounding of 12th-rated Mason City Newman Monday, July 14 at Cresco that punched the Hawks’ ticket to next week’s Class 1A State Tournament in Fort Dodge.
Holding a 32-9 overall record, Kee will face off against Class 1A second-rated Lynnville-Sully Tuesday, July 22 at 1 p.m., a team that boasts a 34-1 mark and finished as Class 1A’s fifth-place State Tournament team last season. Also nicknamed the Hawks, Lynnville-Sully rides a regional tournament wave to Fort Dodge similar to what Kee’s Hawks have enjoyed, defeating their three regional opponents by a combined 34-6 scoring margin and crushing opponents by a 351-42 scoring margin during this season, also similar to Kee’s 331-82 scoring margin on the year.
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