The capper to a long-awaited great season

So many things could have conspired to make the 1989 Toms River High School East softball season yet another season of heartbreak and failure.

Whether it was the first coach of the program, the late Gail Halbfoster, or her successor, Rick Dispoto, or his successor before the 1988 season, Debbie Dietrich, the history of Toms River East softball was one of disappointment.

Sure, there were plenty of fantastic seasons in which the team would win the Shore Conference Class A South title. The Raiders did that five times between 1983-88. But when it came to postseason play, the Raiders had never gotten far enough to claim a title of any kind. As a matter of fact, the only time in the first nine years of the program the Raiders played for a tournament championship was 1987 and they were shocked by Lacey High in the final, 7-5, the Lions being the last of 10 seeds in the Ocean County Tournament that year.

The 1988 Raiders won the Class A South title under Dietrich in her debut year as coach with assistant Diane Morrissey helping her. But Margie Egrie-led Atlantic City would beat the Raiders on the Raiders' home field in the South Jersey Group IV tournament. In the Ocean County Tournament, it was Toms River North taking down the Raiders on the Raiders' home field in the quarterfinal round. And the Raiders would lose to Central Regional, 16-9, in the Shore Conference Tournament quarterfinals at Central as the Golden Eagles were in the middle of a 27-3 season under coach Norm Selby.

But one of the centerpieces of that 1988 Golden Eagles team was about to tip the scales in East's favor in the Fall of 1988. Michelle Carlson was moving with her family out of Bayville into Toms River and though she told yours truly over the years she never planned on leaving Selby and the Golden Eagles' program, that it wasn't going to work semantically. Her parents weren't going to get her in a car and drive from Toms River to Bayville every day, so she was having to enroll in classes at Toms River East as a junior.

And once Dietrich found out about this, she suddenly realized her very good team, which had won 20 games the year before, was about to become better. The all-important battery was established with catcher Kathy Hawtin and pitcher Kim Tompkins beginning their third year together on varsity. Jennifer Brown was back at first base, junior Christine Grice was returning to second base, Cristy Iorio, like the battery, was now the Raiders' established shortstop, and Carlson was going to fit in perfectly at third base, moving Grice from the hot corner to second. The outfield featured seniors Kathy Higley in right field, Sally Ballantyne in left and junior newcomer Jeannine Zarillo in center field. Cheryl Stump would take the pressure off Tompkins ever hitting by being the designated hitter (designated player now).

The Raiders started the 1989 season at 18-0, the second-greatest start behind Toms River South's 19-0 start in 1976. But Greta Jannsch stymied East in the circle down at Southern Regional High and handed the Raiders their first loss of the season, 6-3. The Raiders, though, would not be deterred to win yet another Class A South championship.

First up was the state tournament -- yes, the state tournament was FIRST!! The Raiders won a dramatic, come-from-behind victory over Toms River South for their first-ever state tournament win -- yes, it took all these years to WIN A STATE TOURNAMENT GAME for the program. But in the following game, a gamble in center field by Zarrillo on a low-sinking line drive proceeded to go behind her on East's fence-less outfield and two runs scored -- the only two runs Washington Township needed to beat the Raiders, 2-0.

Uh-oh!! Here we go again!! All I kept thinking was "please don't let arguably the greatest Raiders team assembled go down in flames, too."

Stump delivered a pair of run-scoring doubles in the opening round of the Shore Conference Tournament on Memorial Day, May 29, 3-1. Over a week earlier, the Raiders began the Ocean County Tournament run with a quarterfinal victory over Brick, then defeated Lacey in the semifinals, 8-3, to advance to the final for the second time in three years.

But on May 31, the Raiders were hosting Lacey again, this time in the Shore Conference Tournament quarterfinals. And coach Mike Shern had his Lady Lions ready. They took a 1-0 lead on the old East field which is now a soccer and lacrosse field on the side of the gymnasium. East threatened with Hawtin on second and one out. Grice hit a screaming liner that was ticketed for the left-center field gap. In what I still consider the greatest catch I've ever seen on a softball diamond, left fielder Janene Spitaletto dove to her right and caught the ball while sliding o n East's rough outfield turf. When she got up, she fired the ball into second base to complete the double play as Hawtin was heading back to the dugout thinking she had just scored the tying run.

Lacey built a 3-0 lead going into the sixth. But an error off a steal attempt of third base by pinch-runner Cindy Himpele allowed her to come home and an RBI infield hit by Ballantyne brought home Zarrillo to make it 3-2 going to the seventh.

That was the first time all year I started to feel that "Raider magic." In the bottom of the seventh, Hawtin walked, Grice beat out a sacrifice bunt for a hit and an error by pitcher Patty Brilly on a Higley grounder loaded the bases with no outs. Left-handed hitting Stump came up. On a 1-1 pitch, she drilled a drive into left-center field to score both Hawtin and Grice and complete a 4-3 victory. I watched Raiders players jump up and down in elation and angry and sad Lions players come off the field in dejection.

That was Lacey's win and East was having nothing to do with it.

One night later with the glow of that victory very much apparent, East arrived at Wilbur Thompson Field in Lakewood to play a back-and-forth drama with rival Toms River South, who the Raiders had beaten three times during the season, for the county championship. In a game that saw Tompkins get a line drive back at her face by South's Emily Dupignac, but the blow of that ball hitting her was dulled by her putting her glove up in time, the teams battled to 8-8 by the bottom of the seventh inning.

Once again, though, the "Raider magic" prevailed. Hawtin walked, stole second, took third on a single and once again, it was Stump playing hero by hitting a high chopper to second baseman Marti Seaman, who did not have enough time to throw Hawtin out at the plate as East celebrated its first-ever tournament title, beating the Indians, 9-8.

And once the Raiders won that first important championship in program history, everything else fell into place for what would be the finale. The Raiders came back on Monday, June 5 to take down Wall, 8-1, in the SCT semifinals at Toms River South.

Now one game was left. It was the Shore Conference Tournament final on Wednesday, June 7, 1989, and the last team left standing was Red Bank Catholic. The Caseys were having a really good season at 19-3. The heart of the Casey team was the top of their batting order -- shortstop Megan Zusi leading off, right fielder Jen Gross batting second, pitcher Ellie Traino hitting third and center fielder Kim Harter batting cleanup. Traino, undeniably, was the Caseys' best player, a tall talent at 5-foot-10 who could bring it hard on opposing hitters.

By now, though, these Raiders were confident. The 25-2 record they came into the game with spoke volumes. But, of course, there was one more demon Dietrich, Morrissey and her Raiders needed to turn back -- one of the two losses the Raiders suffered was on this Southern Regional field.

I was at the game covering it as I was expected to as the softball writer for the Ocean County Observer, finishing up my fifth year of covering high school softball. I am a Toms River East graduate so I knew a lot about the program and the players in general. A good amount of them were seniors on this team and were graduating with my sister that June.

Well, Asbury Park Press softball writer Theresa Shevlin arrived at Southern moments after I had gotten there and she was an unabashed RBC grad. This made for interesting coverage. I sat up top of the small bleachers along the first-base side, Theresa sitting along the first row. She looks at me and tells me she thinks this is going to be her alma mater's day and they'll break through against the top-seeded Raiders.

I looked at her, smiled and said, "No chance."  Traino needed to be better than excellent to keep this Raider lineup down. And after the first three batters in the Casey lineup hit groundballs to Iorio (two of them) and Carlson that they turned into outs. I was pretty confident on what the outcome was going to be. In the first, Ballantyne got a base hit, but Traino got Iorio and Brown to fly out to end the inning.

In the second, that got tested though, when Harter hit a grounder that swallowed up Brown for an error. One out later, Karen Taylor bunted her up to second, but in what would be her last game as a Raider, Tompkins got Dana Jack to pop out to Iorio.

In the bottom of the second, Grice singled with one out. Traino struck out Higley, but Stump walked to put runners on first and second and bring up No. 9 hitter Zarrillo. Ever since that line drive in the Washington Township game went under her glove allowing the only two runs of the game to score, she had beaten herself up for the mistake. Now, Zarrillo had a chance to redeem herself in the first huge moment of the game.

And, oh, did she ever do so. On a 1-2 offering from Traino, Zarrillo drilled the ball over Harter's head. I'm guessing Harter did not think a No. 9 hitter could launch a rocket over her head. She was proven wrong. Grice and Stump scored and Zarrillo landed a third with a triple.

Zarrillo's shot had practically opened the cork to the champagne and the soon-to-be celebration. Still, to this day, it's one of the biggest clutch hits I've ever witnessed.

But the inning was not over yet. Leadoff hitter Carlson was hit by a pitch and openly took second base. Ballantyne hit a grounder at Jack, who muffed it for an error, allowing Zarrillo and Carlson to score to make it 4-0.

In the third inning, Kim Dollinger singled. RBC put the hit and run on with No. 9 hitter and designated hitter Melissa DelPresto at the plate. But DelPresto popped up to Brown, who only had to step on the base to complete the double play. Zusi flied out to Zarrillo and suddenly, RBC looked like a confused team down 4-0 and East was a confident team which could sense the blood in the water.

In the bottom of the third, Hawtin and Grice started the inning with singles. Grice beat out a close play at second on a Higley grounder to load the bases. But things started looking bad for East. Stump struck out and Hawtin was thrown out at home trying to score on a passed ball (the backstop on Southern's old field wasn't too deep in those days).

So with two outs and runners on second and third after the out at the plate, Zarrillo stepped up again. On a 2-1 pitch, she drilled a shot to left-center field for a single that brought in Grice and Higley and it was 6-0.

Meanwhile, Tompkins settled into a groove. She retired five of the next six batters in the fourth and fifth innings, but with two outs in the fifth, Dollinger doubled. With Liz Ryan at 1-2 in the count, RBC thought it might be a good time to catch the Raiders sleeping. Pinch-runner Nicole Gross took off for third, but Tompkins was fully aware of what was happening and fired to Carlson, who chased Gross back to Grice, who caught the ball and made the tag for the third out.

These Raiders could simply do no wrong. Traino, who the next time I would see on a softball field was in some professional league in the mid-1990s that ESPN2 used to show the games, the same league that also had Michelle Carlson playing in it, kept the deficit to 6-0 heading to the bottom of the sixth, hoping to give the Caseys one more chance in what was already a humbling experience. Traino got Stump to line out to open the inning, but her personal kryptonite, Zarrillo, was up again. She drilled another single to left field to be 3-for-3 for the game.

Carlson worked out a walk. An error by Traino trying to throw out Zarrillo at second moved the runners up a base. Ballantyne hit a grounder that they tried to get Zarrillo again at third, but she beat the play back to the base, loading the bases for Iorio. Iorio singled to center to score Zarrillo and Carlson, and when Traino committed another error on the play, that allowed Ballantyne to come home from first to make it 9-0.

The story of the '89 East season was almost finished. Traino helped finish it for East when she threw a wild pitch to Brown on the first pitch of the at-bat, allowing Iorio to scamper home with the 10th and final run of the game.

And it was over -- East had the emphatic 10-0 victory over the Caseys and their first-ever Shore Conference Tournament. Tompkins finished her career in terrific fashion, allowing three hits, walking one batter and striking out three to finish her season at 26-2 like the team. Both she and Zarrillo were the stars of the capper to one of Ocean County's greatest seasons.

It was also East's breakthrough to what would be an amazing 26-year career for Dietrich, now Debbie Schwartz, as head coach. Now Donovan Catholic's head coach, Schwartz's Griffins won the overall NJSIAA Tournament of Champions title in 2019, exactly 30 years to the day East won her first-ever title as coach in the OCT final over Toms River South.

East players rightfully celebrated this amazing 26-2 season, but realized this would be the last time they would be together. But it was a longer ride home than expected. I remember heading back onto the Garden State Parkway, but traffic came to a standstill due to an accident miles up the road. I got to the Lacey Township rest stop and just took a walk to the northbound-side of the Parkway to see how long the traffic was. Suddenly, I see a Toms River bus coming up on right side. One of the East players asked what was going on and I told them there seemed to be an accident up ahead. We had about a three-minute conversion before the bus could move up a little more. 

I eventually got back to the Observer to write the story and continue working on the Lacey-Middletown North girls soccer championship in the SCT. Lacey would win that championship, 4-2.

I had one more final thing to do and that was write about the All-County team for softball in which Carlson, Tompkins, Higley, Ballantyne, Hawtin and Stump made first team.

That 1989 season ended in a way a great team's season should win -- a title-game victory. That '89 East team was special ... and found its way out of possible pitfalls of its past to prevail as a two-time tournament champion.

When I told Theresa Shevlin that RBC had no chance to beat East, I meant it. It wasn't small talk.

These East Raiders were committed to putting an exclamation point on what was a great year.