A couple of weeks before Trinity Lutheran softball started its season, senior pitcher Kamzi Gross suffered a hairline fracture in her left hand and was sidelined for at least the first month of the season.

Gross was the Cougars’ senior standout in the circle, called upon to pitch a majority of games and innings. With her out, that task was handed off to a freshman.

Grace Lance has been playing softball for four years and didn’t start pitching until the last two years when she noticed her team only had one pitcher and asked her dad, “Can I learn how, just so she can have some help?”

Two years later, Lance has become the Cougars’ ace. Through five games, Trinity is 5-0, and Lance has five wins under her belt.

“It wasn’t overwhelming. It was just kind of nerve-wracking,” Lance said. “Kamzi is a senior this year. She has been doing this her whole career. It sucks that she’s not here, but just having her as an inspiration and talking to her when I need help is also nice. I knew it was going to be hard, but I knew I could do it.”

In Lance’s first career game, she threw a no-hitter in a 17-0 win over South Decatur. She didn’t even realize she threw a no-hitter until basketball coach Mike Lang congratulated her on it the next day at a basketball meeting.

“So then I looked at the paper, it said I had a no-hitter, so that was pretty cool,” she said.

Lance has thrown 39 strikeouts in her 33 innings pitched this season. She said she has talked with Gross a lot about seventh inning stamina and how to stay sharp when you’re fatigued.

The southpaw said she likes throwing to the outside corner and mentionedshe has a good screwball that screws to the outside of the plate.

“I like the outside corner because hitters tend to reach out of it and try to poke it in play rather than taking it to left field,” Lance said. “So I kind of stay on that outside corner, and because I’m a lefty, that’s where my arm naturally wants to go.”

Lance said she couldn’t have done it without the defense behind her, though. When teams put the ball in play, she trusts her defense to always make the right play.

“Our team works really well as a team,” Lance said. “We try to be behind each other all the time, and we talk a lot on defense, and we’re always hyping each other up when we’re down. Our shortstop, Bailey Tabeling, I don’t think I could’ve done it without her. She’s always behind my back telling me good job.”

The Cougars have hit two home runs this season, and both have come from freshmen. Lance hit one in the second game of the season, and Madison Keith hit one, as well.

“She’s a really good basketball player. She’s just a talented athlete,” Lance said of Keith.

She also brought up Dianna Munoz, Morgan Brewer and Olivia Cain as other key underclassmen that makes up Trinity’s young core.

Trinity has a good mix of experience and youth this season, and Gross finds out early next week if she can return to the team this season.

The Cougars play at Henryville next Tuesday, and that’ll be a good measuring stick as to where the team is in terms of competing for a sectional title.

“They’re our biggest threat in sectional. I think once we play them, that’s a really big indicator on if we can win sectional or not,” Lance said. “But I feel like this teamwork is nothing like any other team I’ve played on. We’re always behind each other. I think no other team can touch us if we work together as a team.”

Trinity has outscored opponents 41-12 so far this season. The Cougars know it has only been five games, and there’s plenty of more work to be done, but that’s what they’re all about — working hard.

“This team is capable of anything as long as we just stick together,” Lance said. “Teamwork makes the dream work, and our dream is to definitely keep on winning.”