Alayna Schulte, Sophia Schlader on Waukee Northwest softball's win

So obviously coming in you kind of have that target on your back as number one seed's reigning champs. How do you feel like you guys have handled that pressure coming in? We just all kind of like take a breath as a team and like mentally prepared like leading up to this and we're so closely like bonded together that we all know how to calm each other's nerves down. At once feeling a little anxious like we know what to say and pick them up and we go from there. I agree. I feel like the whole season we've kind of had a target on our back even since my eighth grade year like being walking northwest and I think we've just learned how to play under the pressure and just play as a team and come together. Nine strikeouts for you today. How does it feel to kind of come in and just fall back into that regular rhythm? Yeah it feels awesome. I really I there's a lot of ground balls. My team did awesome fielding. A lot of fly balls. I couldn't have done it without them. I just felt confident being able to throw my stuff and if they hit it my team will get it. And a good day for you at plate as well. What was kind of working for you? Is it just that you're used to being here at this point? That definitely helps. Yeah being my fifth year the nerves have came down like it's every year it's gotten easier and less anxious but I just kind of I read the defense and if they're playing up I'm just gonna drive it right in their faces pretty much and if they're playing back I'm gonna bun it and use my speed to help me. You jump out to that 4-0 lead and then you kind of held on to it the whole time. What kind of learning lessons do you take from this game into the rest of the week? I feel like definitely scoring the first and like scoring the first inning gave us a lot of energy and we really took that and I feel like we won that game after the first inning like just with the energy side and I think learning wise from that game we need to score more like throughout the game and not just relying on one inning but I think we really carried ourselves well that game and played together as a team. Yeah.