FAIRFIELD — Entering Tuesday morning, the last memory the Lawrence softball team had on the field together was a painful one, one that followed a hard-fought battle that ended in a narrow defeat.

Well, the Bulldogs began a new campaign with another shot at the team that ended their season in 2022 — and this time, it was no battle, and there would be no feelings of dejection.

Lawrence opened the 2023 season Tuesday with a 16-1 victory over Winslow in a Kennebec Valley Conference Class B North showdown. The Bulldogs got strong pitching from Sage Reed (eight strikeouts, three hits), added timely hits and took advantage of a mistake-strewn showing from the Black Raiders in the five-inning, mercy rule-shortened win. 

“We were excited (when we saw they were the first team on our schedule),” said Reed, whose team lost 3-2 to Winslow in last year’s Class B North semifinals. “It was a revenge game. We remembered that they’re the team that ended our season last year, and we wanted to get them back.”

After Winslow went up 1-0 in the top of the first, Lawrence batted around as it used five hits and a series of wild pitches to take a 5-1 lead into the second. The Bulldogs scored four more in the second despite getting just one hit in the frame as the walks, errors and passed balls mounted for the Black Raiders.

The third inning was a similar story as Lawrence plated four more runs on just two hits. Reed then threw a five-pitch fourth, and after the Bulldogs scored another three runs, she struck out the side in the fifth to complete the mercy-rule victory.

“I just figured out where I could throw it where their hitters couldn’t hit it,” said Reed, an All-KVAC Class B first-team selection last season. “I threw some good pitches, but really, it was our whole team today. We played hard today, and everybody came out and did their job.”

Lawrence’s Ruby Pierce is congratulated by first base coach David Veilleux after Pierce hit a single to bring in a run against Winslow on Tuesday at Lawrence High School in Fairfield. Rich Abrahamson/Morning Sentinel

It was certainly a well-rounded effort for the Bulldogs, with eight of their nine starters registering at least one hit. Four Lawrence players had two hits each: Reed (two singles, RBI), Maylie Knox (two singles), Jade Sullivan, (single, double) and Jazmin Johnson (two singles, two RBIs).

Nevaeh Duplessie, Hannah Daigneault and Lacey Sillanpaa had hits for Winslow. Emma Michaud (one strikeout, four walks in 2 1/3 innings) and Grace Melvin (one strikeout, one walk in 1 2/3 innings) split pitching duties for the Black Raiders, whose six errors were compounded by Lawrence’s aggressive baserunning.

“We figured out early, ‘Hey, we’ve got to be aggressive and get out and go,’” Lawrence head coach Joey Marcoux said. “I thought we got better with that as the game went on. Having that awareness in those situations and having aggressive baserunning, that’s really important.”

With Winslow returning much of its 2022 Class B North title-winning roster, the Black Raiders were an obvious pick to contend for the crown again in 2023. Michaud, whom Lawrence tagged for eight earned runs Tuesday, is one of the KVAC’s top pitchers, and fellow returnees Duplessie, Sillanpaa and Kate Nichols also made big impacts.

Yet Lawrence, which went 14-5 last year, was also tipped to do well with seven of its eight starters returning. In a Class B field that saw so many games decided by such slim margins a year ago, the Bulldogs believe they’ve returned even stronger — and with efforts such as this one, the rest of the state has been put on notice.

“Getting a win like this to start the season, it feels really good,” Sullivan said. “We know they’re a good team. We just have a lot of confidence; we know what we did last year, and we think we’re right there with anybody.”

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