Triple Crown: MP's Muniz leads Pride in 3 major areas

Of all the questions Danielle Muniz's play will spring this season - How did she do that? Do I really have to pitch to this girl? - only one is the toughest.

What is Mountain Pointe softball's shortstop/three-hole hitter/ace better at: fielding, hitting or pitching?

"Oh wow. I actually don't know," said senior outfielder Lauren Irwin. "I couldn't say. She does a great job for us in everything."

"You can't make that choice," added a laughing Mel Wendell, MP's coach. "She's good in every avenue that she's at right now.

"She's the girl that you want to have on the mound, she's the girl that you want to have at short, she's the girl you want to have at the plate. You can't even say where she's better at because she's good at every position that she plays."

It's games like the March 4  8-3 win over Chandler Hamilton that remind the Class 5A-Division I softball world why Muniz - or, as she's affectionately referred to by her teammates, coaching staff and Pride faithful, "Petey" - is one of the most versatile players in the sport.

Incidentally, "Petey" stems from when Muniz was younger and her cousins thought "I looked like Tweety Bird," Muniz said. But they couldn't pronounce "Tweety" and so "Petey" was born.

In the first inning of the game against the Huskies, Muniz found herself in a jam with one run already across and another runner on third base with only one out. Muniz calmly stepped out of the circle, took a deep breath, and struck out the next two batters to end the threat.

Batting third for the Pride the next half inning, with center fielder Holly Phillips on second, Muniz laced a double that knotted the game at one.

Hamilton would retake the lead at 2-1 in the second, but her teammates responded instantly, loading the bases and pushing one across to tie it at 2. Then it was Muniz's turn at-bat again, with runners still on first and third.

First pitch ball. Same with the second pitch. And the third. Finally, Hamilton pitcher Lindsey Carter threw one right down the pipe to make it a 3-1 count.

Muniz zeroed in on the next pitch, drilling it over the left fielder's head for a two-RBI triple. She was now 3-for-3 with two doubles, a triple and four RBIs. Oh, and she had four strikeouts through two innings on the mound.

"She's definitely one to keep in the lineup, always," Irwin said. "No matter where, whether she's pitching or playing shortstop, she's definitely one to keep in the lineup."

Muniz then began to mow through the Husky lineup, retiring nine of the next 10 batters she faced.

She didn't allow another hit until the sixth inning, when Hamilton's Lauren Anderson had a lead-off single and came around to score on a wild pitch.

In the final inning, Muniz notched her 10th and final strikeout of the game.

Her torrid day at the plate seemed to have carried over to the circle, and to an 8-3 Pride win.

"They kind of both have to be on the same track," Muniz said. "If I'm not pitching good, hitting is kind of off. If I'm not hitting, pitching is kind of off. But today, they were both on."

But Wendell said she tends to see a bit of a separation.

"If she does well on offense, I think it gives her the confidence on the mound," Wendell said, "because she's got runs, she's got the lead, so she has that confidence to where she can play around with her pitches a little bit more and throw around those batters."