ALBERTON – One player will get to represent all of Alberton during the spring varsity softball season as part of the Alberton and Frenchtown co-op softball team.

Alberton Sophomore Kaitlyn Galahan will join 23 girls from Frenchtown. The team will have five seniors and five juniors while the remainder are sophomores or freshmen. According to Head Coach Eli Field, the team performed the final cuts last week. He said 29 girls came out for tryouts at the start of the season.

Field was happy to have Galahan on the team this year. He hoped she would have joined the team last year, but she was not able to. Even though she was a sophomore and untested, the coach felt Galahan was a talented player who would be competing for playing time this season. She might even get to play during the varsity games this season.

The Alberton and Frenchtown girls are the defending Class A Champions this year. Field said they had the same pitcher as last year and was confident it would give them an advantage. The rest of the team was fairly experienced as well and he had high hopes for their performance this year. There are approximately 12 of the 16 state champions on the team this season.

“It’s a pretty talented group all the way through,” Field said. “That’s always a good help.”

Last week, the team did not get much time to practice. The team held tryouts all week. Field said it was difficult to say how the team was at this point because of how early it was.

While they have not had many practices, Field said the girls were doing well. They have been having a good time and working hard to get ready for the season.

Field said the team was lucky to be practicing outside already. The recent heavy snowfalls have kept many teams from practicing on their fields. This has led to delays in their ability to practice. Frenchtown’s field is still thawing out and only recently became usable by the team.

“It’s been a tough week just to get everything going,” Field said.

Another thing to slow the team down was the transition from basketball season. Field said the Frenchtown basketball team just finished their season and the girls immediately transitioned into softball on Monday, March 17.

There are only a few softball teams in the area who will pose some competition. Field said Polson has a history of fielding a strong team, as does Columbia Falls. As a result, he felt these would likely be some of the biggest opposition. The team will compete in the Northwest League where three teams from the division will go on to the State Championship.

“It’ll be a battle between four of us even to get into state,” Field said. “That would be between Polson, Libby, Columbia Falls and ourselves…There is some pretty good softball getting played in the northwestern area here.”

The first softball game for the Frenchtown-Alberton co-op team will be on Thursday, April 3, in Frenchtown. The team will play approximately 22 games this year with the first one going against the Corvallis Lady Blue Devils.