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Two solid pitching efforts and a barrage of solid, line-drive base hits gave Tomah a 5-2, 14-3 doubleheader victory over the Onalaska High School summer softball team July 30 in Tomah.

Despite the losses, Onalaska finished its season with a 15-12 record. Onalaska has not posted a winning record in high school varsity play since 2002, when they went 11-8.

Tomah never trailed in either game. In the first game, Tomah grabbed a 4-0 lead in the bottom of the second.

Tomah pitcher Ali Van Havermaet was dominant through the first four innings. She allowed just two runners during that span, one of which was gunned down stealing by catcher Brooke Von Haden.

Van Havermaet got into a jam in the fifth, when she started the inning by tossing five straight balls. A wild pitch and error ruined Van Havermaet's shutout, but she nailed down the victory by inducing an infield popup to end the game. In five innings, Van Havermaet struck out seven and allowed just three hits.

Tomah was the road team in the second game and didn't waste any time collecting runs against Onalaska starting pitcher Sara Helgerson. Tomah busted the game wide open in the fourth with seven runs.

Betthauser took a shutout and no-hitter into the fourth inning until Onalaska's Melissa Snow cracked a one-out triple that brought home Onalaska's first run. Onalaska scored two more runs in the bottom of the fifth, but the game ended when an Onalaska runner was gunned down at home plate.

Onalaska posted a winning record in its reincarnation of its summer program in 2006, finishing 8-6. But this year's mark came against a much stronger schedule, including a tournament in River Falls.

“I am very happy with how the season went this summer,” Onalaska head coach Andi Vogler said. “We established more of an offense and the girls showed an increased commitment to softball.

“Expanding the schedule to include tournaments was essential. Although we faced some of the same teams in tournaments as in league, it did bring us more competition with a larger variety of teams. Tournament play also is more intense.”

Vogler said she hates making prediction. But the improved record against improved competition leads to the question of whether the increased summer success will lead to the high school varsity's first winning record in more than a half-dozen years.

“Even with the success during the summer, this teams needs to do more in order to post a winning record in the MVC,” Vogler said. “Summer teams are never the same; some of the top players in the MVC play on traveling teams, or key players are gone on vacation.”

For the rest of this story, go to www.onalaskalife.com/sports

So beating an MVC team, or losing to an MVC team during the summer is never a fantastic predictor of how you'll do in the spring.

“Given all that, this Onalsaka team has the most overall athleticixm and knowledge of the game that I've been around to coach. They also are the most dedicated, and in order for them to do great things in the spring, that dedication has to remain high.”

Despite high school coach Katie Strey graduating from UW-La Crosse in December and student teaching at Tomah and Holmen, leaving her status at the helm of the program undecided for next spring, Vogler said she will not return to coach the high school varsity, which she did from 2005-2007.