July 5, 2025
By Courtney Oakes
DENVER | Bubbles and balls were flying through the air Saturday afternoon at the Kennedy Sports Complex, especially with Colorado Batbusters National Smith at the plate.
Coach Isaac Martinez’s Batbusters swatted three home runs —after which the hitter was ritually greeted at home plate by teammates with a cascade of bubbles, an American flag and hat — and pounded out 14 hits in just five at-bats of a 13-7 victory over Virginia Glory National Broncowicz in a B bracket matchup of teams that both came into the contest 5-1 in the 16U Supplemental Power Pool portion of the Colorado 4th of July tournament.
Power was only part of the equation, however, for the Batbusters in a win that moved the locally based program into Sunday’s 16-team championship bracket. They will return to Kennedy Sports Complex for an 8 a.m.contest against a yet-to-be-determined opponent.
“We’ve always had the power, we’ve just been waiting for it and now it’s coming out,” Martinez said. “It’s the right time of year. The girls have been smoking the ball and putting it out a lot. I think we’re up to21 home runs so far in this tournament, but who’s counting?”
Offense has been the name of the game for the Batbusters in the tournament, as they came into the contest having scored in double figures in five of six contests. The lone exception was a three-run output in their only loss, a 12-3 defeat to Team North Carolina (Tucker/Benson) on July 3.
Against Virginia Glory National Broncowitz, it wasn’t so much how the home runs came as when they came for the Batbusters, who got back-to-back solo shots from Olivia McDermott and Campbell Trombly to open a five-run second-inning rally.
The Glory had a 6-2 lead (as it bid to score in double figures for a fourth straight game) going into the frame after a five-run rally of its own, but McDermott drilled a ball over the center field fence with an0-2 count to begin a response from the Batbusters.
Trombly also fell behind in the count against Glory starter Anisa Noorani before she launched a ball to left center that easily went out.
“I knew she was going to throw something down the middle because she threw me right inside to start, so I was just waiting on that pitch and I just hit it,” said Trombly, who credits her team’s power from regular hitting against high-powered pitching machines in practice. “(Going back-to-back) puts pressure on their defense to make outs and I know our other people behind us will just hit and hit and hit.”
That’s exactly what the rest of the lineup did, as the next three hitters in the inning — Ari Keiter, Emma Brown and Isabella Holcomb — all came through with base hits. Holcomb (who had a team-high three hits) singled in Keiter and Brown, then came home on Stella Emnott’s single to put the Batbusters in front 7-6 after two explosive frames.
Both teams were kept off the board in the third inning as Batbusters starter Julianna Alforo settled in, while reliever Faith Colligan struck out the side for the Glory.
The brief interruption on offense for the Batbusters ended with another five-run rally in the fourth that featured their third home run, a two-run blast off the bat of Kayleigh Garcia. McDermott and Holcomb also knocked in runs in the frame, while the Batbusters scored again in their final at-bat on a sacrifice fly off the bat of leadoff hitter Caitlin Fairchild.
“I think we’ve just been consistent about putting the ball in play,” said Martinez, a recently promoted one-star general in the Army. “We know if we put the ball in play, good things happen. Today, we did a really good job with two strikes, a couple of the long balls were with two strikes, so the girls understand why you get three strikes and how you have to stay focused.”
The Glory — which left the bases loaded in the first inning and scored five times in the second as Jillian Zaneis, Baylee Stevens and Lucy Strawn knocked in runs — managed only one run in the last three innings. Two throwing errors on the same play allowed Emma Robles to score after she had singled off Batbusters reliever Joline Qualteri.
The Batbusters got the rest of the day off to get ready for play Sunday, where they could play as many as four games if they advance all the way to the 2 p.m. championship game at Kennedy Sports Complex.
“I think there’s still a lot of energy and a lot of legs left in them,” Martinez said of his team. “We have 14 stacked players, so I think we’re ready for tomorrow.”
