It serves as a reminder to Dundee-Crown’s McKayla Anderson, but it hasn’t slowed her down.
Far from it.
The occasional ache or tightness in the senior pitcher’s right hand, especially on cold, damp spring days, also isn’t strong enough to help Anderson predict the weather.
Still, she will never her forget that seven screws remain in three bones she broke in that hand safely sliding headfirst into home plate six games into her freshman year for the Chargers.
“It’s easier to get sore,” Anderson said. “I keep a hand warmer in my pocket and it helps some.”
And when the temperatures rise, like they have this week?
Dundee-Crown’s opponents better beware because the SIU Edwardsville recruit is often dealing out the pain. Such was the case Wednesday in a Fox Valley Conference game at Jacobs.
Anderson struck out 13 in firing her second no-hitter of the season in a 10-0 win for the Chargers.
“She stays focused, is always locked in and brings a mental aspect to it,” Dundee-Crown coach Matthew Goetz said. “She’s got a lot of nice pitches to choose from and she moves it around a lot.
“She throws curves, drop curves, screwball is pretty nice. I think it moves so much inside it throws off some umpires here and there. And she’s really brought the rise to offset the other two.”
Dundee-Crown’s McKayla Anderson (10) follows through on a hit against Jacobs during a Fox Valley Conference game in Algonquin on Wednesday, April, 10, 2024. (H. Rick Bamman / The Beacon News)
Anderson (3-6) walked one, hit another and gave up just one ball hit out of the infield to help Dundee-Crown (4-7, 2-2) take down the Eagles (1-5, 0-3).
A .355 hitter, Anderson also led a 13-hit attack with three, including two of her team’s six doubles off three different Jacobs’ pitchers.
Senior shortstop Annabelle Pederson, junior outfielder Alyssa Gale and sophomore first baseman Jordyn Jeffs each had two hits.
“She does everything,” Goetz said. “I mean, she started a little slow this season, but she can do it all and has been the last couple years. She came out as a freshman and had two home runs in her first five games.”
Anderson, who has 87 strikeouts in 52 1/3 innings this spring, set the program’s single-season record last spring with 268. The career mark might have been a lock had she not lost much of that freshman season, but the career standard for home runs remains a possibility.
Dundee-Crown’s McKayla Anderson (10) and Brianna Hamblen (14) slap gloves after an Anderson strikeout against Jacobs in the sixth inning of a Fox Valley Conference game in Algonquin on Wednesday, April, 10, 2024. (H. Rick Bamman / The Beacon News)
Four sophomore starters for the Chargers are among 11 returnees that feature just three seniors from a team that finished 18-13 last season and took third in the conference.
Goetz believes the conference, overall, has improved but his players are looking up.
“As long as we’re on, we can go with anyone,” Anderson said, adding the team’s bond is its strength. “We make sure we pick each other up and have each other’s back.”
She pointed to a strike-them-out, throw-them-out double play in the fourth Wednesday that was capped by sophomore catcher Casi Attapit nailing a would-be base stealer to end the inning.
“That was awesome,” Anderson said.
Dundee-Crown’s McKayla Anderson (10) reacts in the dugout against Jacobs during a Fox Valley Conference game in Algonquin on Wednesday, April, 10, 2024. (H. Rick Bamman / The Beacon News)
Attapit has come a long way from last spring as a freshman starter who admitted she was initially scared to catch Anderson.
“I only started catching in eighth grade,” Attapit said. “I knew that she was going Division I already and that just intimidated me, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought.”
Anderson’s large repertoire of pitches includes a fastball clocked as high as 67 mph that she rarely throws.
“I don’t throw fastballs in games,” said. “I like my spins. You get the movement, you get the speed. Fastballs, they’re straight. It’s easy to hit something straight — hard to hit something moving.”
