JEFFERSON — First, Olivia Bobak did it with her bat. Then with her arm.

The senior Cheesemaker smoked a 2-run home run in the top of the first inning and then all but shut down Jefferson (23-4) in a 4-2 win in a WIAA Division 2 regional final May 23 at Riverfront Park in Jefferson.

“Liv was really good out there,” Monroe coach Joe O’Leksy said. “Just looking around, we’re playing loose, which is good. We’re playing loose, we’re playing confident.”

Alyse Maurer led off the game with a single but was left stranded at first after the next two batters. Maurer swiped second on a 1-2 count with Bobak at the plate. On the very next pitch, the Monroe cleanup hitter smacked a no-doubt homer into the playground beyond centerfield to stake her team to a 2-0 lead.

“I knew she was going to do something — hit one out, or at least put it in play. And she did,” Maurer said.

Bobak said the short porch didn’t get into her head. She just saw a pitch she wanted and took her chances.

“We don’t go up there trying to hit it over the fence. We just know that we need to score runs to win, so we try to get them to the gaps,” Bobak said. “I don’t even know where (the pitch) was, to be honest. I just knew I wanted to hit it. I put my bat on it and it went farther than I thought it would.”

After a hotly-contested sectional seeding meeting left the lower-ranked Eagles a higher seed than Monroe (20-4), the Cheesemakers were forced to prove themselves on the road after the regional semifinal. With a fence 15 feet shorter than Monroe’s home park at Twining Field, the power-hitting Cheesemakers were more than ready to give out hearty swings.

Monroe took a 3-0 lead in the top of the fifth when Bobak reached on a frozen rope to right. The next batter, Grace Tostrud, put down a bunt with a tail of English to advance the runner. An overthrow to first allowed Tostrud to reach safely and Bobak to score. 

“Having a power hitter coming up and not having a ‘there is no lower than me’ attitude and is willing to bunt. Grace Tostrud is one of our biggest power hitters and she lays down a perfect bunt,” O’Leksy said. “You’re not normally asking a 6-foot tall power hitter to bunt.”

An inning later, Maurer collected her third hit of the game with a low liner to center for a wall-scraping 191-foot home run.

“It was awesome for my first-ever home run to come in a regional championship. It was a really tight game,” Maurer said.

Bobak stifled Jefferson hitters all game, not allowing the Eagles to get into any sort of a rhythm despite a momentary lapse in rhythm herself. 

“She had a spot where she walked three and started losing her control a little bit. We decided we were going to go away a little bit from the inside fastball to the outside fastball and the riseball. We were worried a little bit that their really good hitters were going to sit on that inside fastball,” O’Leksy said. “We went right back to it because it wasn’t working. She got into a rhythm again.”

In the bottom of the sixth, Jefferson put up it’s biggest fight of the game. Two weak singles put runners on first and second, and a sacrifice bunt put both runners in scoring position. Kylee Lukes then picked her pitch and sent a booming shot to the deepest part of the gap in right center, but Monroe senior centerfielder Hailey Betthauser caught it in a dead sprint just feet from the fence. The lead runner at third left early and had to retreat back to third, but by then Betthauser’s relay throw was in the infield with no runs scoring.

“I just kind of found the ball. I took off and reached as far as I could and made sure I watched it go into my glove,” Betthauser said. “It really makes your heart beat fast.”

The very next batter, Claire Peachey hit a bloop on a full count into left center. Shortstop Sydney Updike got turned around but appeared to be tracking the ball into the grass, however Betthauser called her off and missed a diving catch. Both runners easily scored. Bobak got out of the inning on the very next pitch.

“I can’t fault Hailey Betthauser for running from right center to left center and calling off Syd, who probably was the better play, because we hustled the whole time,” O’Leksy said.

Jefferson got a two-out single to second in the bottom of the seventh. Maurer made a diving stop on a hard grounder but was unable to set herself and get a throw off to first in time. Bobak struck out Rachel Neitzel looking to end the game four pitches later.

“Defense and pitching wins. You can manufacture runs, but it seems with defense and pitching, we’re peaking at that right now — which is not a bad time to do it,” O’Leksy said.

Bobak finished with six strikeouts while allowing four hits and three walks. Monroe collected nine hits as a team, but left 11 runners on base.

“We hit the ball, and even when we didn’t score, we put people on base to keep pressure on them at all times,” O’Leksy said.

The win earned the Cheesemakers another chance to play in a sectional semifinal. Monroe’s 2018 season ended in a heartbreaking sectional semifinal loss at home to Delavan-Darien in a pitcher’s duel. 

“I think what happened last year is really driving us this year,” Bobak said.

This year, the Cheesemakers will have to win at second-ranked Whitnall (23-4) May 28. Whitnall thumped Whitewater 15-0 just two days after Whitewater (16-7) knocked off Waukesha Catholic Memorial (18-7), the previous No. 1-ranked team in the state. 

“We’ve worked so hard this year, we know that we have the talent and we just have to come out here and try our best,” Betthauser said.