Tippecanoe Valley’s Alex Gomez makes a throw from center field while Amy Baca looks on during the fourth inning of a game with Pioneer Tuesday. (Photos by James Costello)

AKRON — Coming off an 11-hit, 11-run night against Southwood Monday, Tippecanoe Valley softball coach Daryl Shoemaker was hoping his lineup could stay hot in Tuesday’s non-conference contest with ICGSA Class A, No. 8 Pioneer Tuesday.

But the Lady Panthers’ phenomenal freshman pitcher Hailey Gotshall didn’t give the host Vikings much to work with, Pioneer’s own hard-hitting lineup collected 12 hits, and Valley suffered a 12-0, five-inning setback at home in Akron.

“That’s a good pitcher. There’s nothing else I can say. Look at her numbers — that girl has been lights-out all year,” said Shoemaker of Gotshall.

Hailey Gotshall delivers a pitch for Pioneer. The freshman struck nine, walked none and gave up just three hits in four innings.

“Our talk all game was adjusting — adjusting in the at-bat, adjusting to the next at-bat — and I thought we did an OK job of adjusting. Obviously we didn’t get base hits, we didn’t hit the heck out of the ball but little adjustments — fouling pitches off, striking out the first time at bat, making contact the second, little things like that. That’s just a good pitcher. We haven’t seen one like that in awhile.”

Gotshall wasn’t giving the Vikings many opportunities to adjust, either. The freshman threw just 61 pitches while striking out nine, walking none and surrendering just three hits in four shutout innings. Senior Bailey Zarse came in to finish it off in the fifth, striking out two while retiring the heart of the Valley lineup in order.

“What I tell my pitchers is to get ahead of the batters, work ahead, and then she’s got good movement,” said Pioneer coach Gabrielle Thomas of Gotshall. “When it’s on, it’s on.”

“I looked at the stats before the game, and she didn’t have any walks at all coming into tonight. So our mindset was find fastballs, hit them early,” explained Shoemaker. “She’s not going to waste pitches; she’s going to throw strikes. We didn’t get a chance to see a lot of pitches because we wanted to be aggressive and try to drive that fastball early and maybe get her in trouble.”

Valley’s best opportunity against Gotshall came in the bottom of the first inning, when Vikings pitcher Ally Betten and catcher Kirstyn Yoder lined a pair of back-to-back singles into the outfield to put their team in position to jump on top. But Gotshall fanned Kayla Scott to end the threat, settling in in the second and cruising until Yoder’s second hit in the fourth inning, the Vikings’ only other hit of the night.

Taylor Czichilski makes a throw from third.

“I think it changes the way the girls are going to react to the game. Any time you play a really good team, and you can strike first — especially at home — I think it makes a difference,” Shoemaker said of the missed opportunity in the first. “It was going to be a fight regardless, whether we scored there or not, because they were going to hit all game.”

Hit all game the Panthers did, recording 12 against Betten, who soldiered her way through all five innings inside the circle. The Panthers used six hits, three bases on balls and an error to pile up six runs in the top of the second and never looked back. Mackenzie Walker, Alyssa Shaw and Haley Gleitz collected three hits and two RBIs apiece, and Gleitz — batting in the leadoff spot Tuesday — got all of a 1-2 Betten offering in the fourth, cranking a two-run shot out to left that put Pioneer up 11-0.

“The key to our offense is just being out there and attacking each pitch — finding the pitch that they like to drive. That’s basically what I tell my batters is ‘Find one you like to drive, barrel it up,’” said Thomas. “We’re a good hitting team. We practice offense a lot, and it translates right here.”

Pioneer moved to 8-2 with Tuesday’s win, while Valley slipped to 3-5. The Vikings are back in action tonight in a game at Northfield, scheduled for 5 p.m.