Guatemala City, Guatemala - The Canadian Women’s National Softball Team began the 2022 WBSC Women’s Pan American Championship with a solid 14-0 win over Peru at the Carlos Cano Gomez field on Saturday.  

Canada opened the scoring in the second inning when Emma Entzminger (Victoria, B.C.), sent a 2-1 pitch over the right field fence scoring Janet Leung (Mississauga, Ont.), who had previously singled.  

In the bottom of the second, Sara Groenewegen (Surrey, B.C.), worked around a leadoff double by striking out the final two batters of the inning to keep Peru off the scoreboard.  

Canada pushed four more runs across in the top of the third. Natalie Wideman (Mississauga, Ont.), and Larissa Franklin (Maple Ridge, B.C.) led off the inning with back-to-back singles and were brought home by a 2-run double off the bat of Kelsey Harshman (Delta, B.C). After another single by Kianna Jones (Surrey B.C.), Alysen Febrey (Peachtree, Ga.), and Janet Leung both tallied sacrifice flies to push the Canada lead to 6-0. 

Sara Groenewegen recorded two quick outs in the top of the third inning before being lifted for Ruby Anderson (Victoria, B.C.), who recorded the final out of the inning. Ruby Anderson worked a scoreless fourth inning stranding two runners and recording a strikeout to end the inning. 

Team Canada broke the game open in the top of the fifth recording eight runs on ten hits.  Larissa Franklin led off the inning with a single and was promptly brought home on an RBI double by Kelsey Harshman.  With one out, Alysen Febrey hit a two-run homerun to right-center field. After a single by Janet Leung, Erika Polidori (Brantford, Ont.) hit a triple off the wall into left field to score Leung all the way from first. Natalie Wideman got in on the action hitting an RBI triple as well. Wideman was brought home by Larissa Franklin who recorded her second single of the inning.  

Another double by Kelsey Harshman was followed by an RBI single by Kianna Jones to end the scoring for the maple leaf.  When all was said and done, Canada was ahead 14-0.  

In the bottom of the 5th, Jorde Chartrand (Weyburn, Sask.), came on to record the last three outs for Canada preserving the shutout.   

Five different Canadian batters recorded multiple hits and eight different players tallied an RBI in the contest. The pitching staff for Canada scattered three hits while striking out five batters on the day. 

Canada will face Nicaragua at 3:30pm CST on Sunday, November 13 for Game 2. A livestream feed will be available throughout the tournament on Softball Canada’s Facebook page.