The Shaker Bison will square off against the Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake Spartans at 4:15 p.m. on Friday. The two teams have allowed few runs on average (Shaker 3.2, Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake 3.4) so any runs scored will be well earned.
Shaker is coming in fresh off a high-stakes matchup with another one of New York's top teams: Ballston Spa, who was ranked 19th at the time (Shaker was ranked sixth). The Bison came up short against the Scotties on Wednesday, falling 13-1. Having soared to a lofty 14 runs in the game before, the Bison couldn't push the score so high this time.
Shaker saw four different players step up and record at least one hit. One of them was Gianna Hotaling, who went 1-for-2 with one run and one double.
Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake). They put the hurt on Niskayuna with a sharp 19-2 victory on Wednesday. The Spartans haven't had any issues with the Silver Warriors recently, as the game was their fifth consecutive win against them.
Ava Yahoudy was a major factor while hitting and pitching. She looked comfortable on the mound, striking out six batters over three innings while giving up just one earned run off one hit (and not a single walk). Yahoudy was also big at the plate, going 2-for-3 with two RBI and one run. That's the most hits she has posted since back in May of 2024.
In other batting news, Addisyn Knapik was a standout: she went 3-for-4 with four runs, three RBI, and one double. That's the most RBI she has posted since back in May of 2024. The team also got some help courtesy of Lilly Morse, who went 2-for-3 with one home run, four RBI, and two runs.
Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake was getting hits left and right and finished the game having posted a batting average of .421. They are a perfect 4-0 when they post a batting average of .375 or better.
Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake's victory bumped their record up to 5-2. As for Shaker, they moved to 7-2 with that defeat, which also ended their three-game winning streak.
Shaker couldn't quite finish off Burnt Hills-Ballston Lake in their previous matchup back in April of 2024 and fell 2-0. Will the Bison have more luck at home instead of on the road? Come back here after the game to get an analysis of the match and other softball content.
