Balutowski registers 100th hit, eyes championship next

By Jacob Marrocco
Posted 5/24/16

Pilgrim senior Madison Balutowski does things with a flourish. When she surpassed the all-time goals scored record for high school girls' hockey, she did it with a postseason hat trick. This past Friday, she

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Balutowski registers 100th hit, eyes championship next

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Assistant Sports Editor

Pilgrim senior Madison Balutowski does things with a flourish.

When she surpassed the all-time goals scored record for high school girls’ hockey, she did it with a postseason hat trick.

This past Friday, she reached the 100-hit mark for her softball career with a 3-for-4 performance, falling a home run short of the cycle, in Pilgrim’s 18-4 victory over Central.

“I feel successful,” Balutowski said, with a smile, of her career accomplishments in hockey and softball thus far. “The amount of work I put in to hockey and softball, it just feels so good to be able to look back and see how much I achieved in only four years.”

“It’s just amazing,” Debra Tucci, Balutowski’s mother, said. “She has worked hard, all her sports. She’s an all-around athlete. It’s just amazing. Whatever she plays, she plays her whole heart and soul.”

The leadoff hitter and center fielder strolled to the plate for her first at-bat with 97 career hits, and started out down 0-2 in the count. On pitch No. 3, she ripped a triple into the right center field gap to start the inning. She came around to score on a double by Jeriann Evans for the first Pats run of the day.

She came up again in the bottom of the second and blooped a double into right field, eventually scoring on Olivia King’s RBI single.

Balutowski struck out in her first at-bat of the third inning, but would come back up again after Pilgrim batted around.

She wouldn’t disappoint. Balutowski slapped an opposite-field RBI single to notch hit No. 100, and she was awarded the ball after being removed from the game to an applauding audience and bench.

“It’s something that you have to play four years for and play consistent four years for,” Pilgrim manager Bill Aquilante said. “It’s just not something you can do in one season. One hundred hits is a sign of a great career and four great seasons. She came into the season [at] 75, so we knew it was gonna be close. I didn’t even tell her until she got to 97. I didn’t want to put a lot of pressure on her.”

Balutowski has now registered more than 100 hits and 100 goals for her career, speaking to her dynamic abilities as an athlete. She is also a state champion in hockey, winning the D-I title in 2013-14 and the DeCosta championship in 2014-15, but her resilience would be tested this year.

She and her Warwick Co-op teammates were set for another run at the state trophy against rival La Salle when their disqualification was announced just hours before puck drop because of an academically ineligible player. Superintendent Philip Thornton would later admit that school system error was the reason for the oversight, as report cards had been released six weeks prior, but the damage had been done.

Balutowski had finished off the semifinals against Barrington Co-op by padding her all-time goals lead, and she looked to add to it at Brown University in the finals. Abruptly, she was forced to turn her attention to softball season early.

“It was difficult,” Tucci said. “She didn’t want to come to practice. She knew she had to be here. The coach told her to take the day off. I came here, I said ‘I don’t think she should have the day off. I want you to call her and get her here.’ And when she did get here, all the girls ran off the field, they huddled her and she knew it was gonna be okay.”

Now Balutowski, the lone senior on the softball roster, looks to end her Pilgrim career on a high note. The Pats are 9-4 in Division II-West and have scored 150 runs this season in league play, 28 more than first-place North Providence. Their offense helps pace the solid pitching of Morgan Almon and Katrina Kazen, and the combination can help the Pats make a run for Rhode Island College for the first time since 2013.

Hoisting another trophy would be a fitting way to go out for a star player like Balutowski.

“For softball, we’re always trying to go for that championship,” Balutowski said. “We’ve come close my freshman year, but we haven’t quite got there yet. The way the hockey season ended, the whole team’s on my side trying to push me to get a championship.”

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  • WAquilante

    Congrats Maddie on an awesome career!!

    Thursday, May 26, 2016 Report this