By DAN PAWLOWSKI
WAKEFIELD — The Wakefield High softball team made their 2025 Middlesex League Freedom Division championship official last night with an 11-3 victory over Wilmington at Veterans Field.
With the victory, the Warriors improved to 14-3 overall and 10-2 in league play all while completing the season sweep of the Wildcats. Wakefield also beat Burlington twice this season. Those three tied for the Freedom Division title last year. That was the first league title for Wakefield softball since 1982.
Now, the trophy belongs to the Warriors alone.
“The goal every year as a program is to keep expanding and keep getting better,” said head coach Chris Tolios. “We want to build off of the previous year and keep the train moving forward in a positive direction. So this year coming in, the goal that the girls had was to separate themselves from the rest of the division after having a tie for the title last year.
“I’m really proud of them and how they took that goal and committed to it. They knew they had to earn it and they’ve played some really good softball this year to sweep the Division and only lose two league games overall.”
Sophomore Kayla Shaw got the win in the circle, limiting the Wildcat bats while Wakefield’s offense went to work.
Junior Kathryn Sliski and sophomores Chloe Seto, Penelope Abreu and Molly Burns each drove in two runs to lead the offense.
Seto went 3-for-4 on the day. She now has a .404 batting average.
Burns went 2-for-3 and scored 2 runs. Her average is now an even .500 and according to Tolios has gotten the attention of the league as an MVP candidate due to her work at the plate and defense at shortstop.
Sliski, Wakefield’s ace, went 3-for-4, upping her average to .355.
Senior Jade Waterhouse also had a big hit for Wakefield to separate from the visitors in the middle innings.
“What impressed me the most was how we rebounded from Sunday’s game where we really just weren’t present at all — probably our worst game of the season,” said Tolios after Wakefield’s 2-1 loss to Belmont. “I was curious to see what the tone would be on Tuesday.”
The Warriors responded by putting up 5 runs in the 1st inning on their way to a complete victory. In addition to Shaw’s pitching and the offense’s 11 runs on 13 hits, Wakefield played great defense and ran the bases aggressively.
Afterwards, Wakefield celebrated one of their preseason goals and will now look to end the regular season strong while looking ahead to the state tournament. They have three regular season games left: tonight against Marblehead, Friday at Lynnfield and Saturday against Newton North. The Warriors were ranked No. 11 in the latest Div. 2 power rankings that were released on Tuesday. The brackets will be released a week from today.
“We’re looking forward to the last three games and then seeing where we fall in the tournament,” said Tolios. “It has been a fun Spring but I don’t think we’re ready for the fun to be over.”