By Steve Bigham

S

amantha and Cathy Byrne are largely considered to be the best sister act ever to grace the Newtown High School softball scene. For seven consecutive seasons, the sibling pitchers mowed down the competition with an array of pitches that bedazzled batters, most of whom were promptly sent back to the bench, the victims of a blazing fastball or a vicious curve.

In all, these loving siblings struck out nearly 1,300 batters.

Sam shattered the NHS strikeout record in 1996, only to have her record broken by her little sister three years later. They are records that are expected to remain on the books for a long time to come.

This week we honor this sister act by inducting both into the Bee Sports Hall of Fame.

These days, the Byrne sisters are still playing organized softball. Sam is a pitcher for the softball team at Southern Connecticut State University, while Cathy tosses at The Centenary in Louisiana. Cathy just completed her freshman year at the Division I school and admits she had mixed results. She is believed to be the only NHS softball player ever to compete at the Division I level.

“It was tough to make the adjustment. The hitters are more advanced,” Cathy said. “We played schools like Boston College, Brown and Cal State Fullerton. We played 70 games and I pitched 67 innings.”

Too old to play travel ball anymore, the sisters played occasionally in the Danbury Women’s softball league this summer and are preparing to go back to college this month. Samantha burst on the scene during the mid 1990s and proceeded to run ramshackle through the league.

She graduated in 1997 as the school’s all-time leading strikeout queen, as her 599 strikeouts well surpassed the original record of 510 set by 1984 graduate Kim DeCarlo. At the time, the record appeared unreachable – even to her sister, a freshman at the time, who got little playing time.

As Cathy’s mother Marcy recalls, Cathy felt she would never have a chance to break the record since she recorded just 22 strikeouts in 16 innings as a freshman. Samantha, on the other hand, was a four-year starting pitcher.

But after putting up incredible numbers during her sophomore and junior seasons, Byrne’s dream of surpassing her sister’s mark appeared within reach. And the record continued to get closer as her senior season rolled along. She finally hit the mark on a warm spring day at Treadwell Park, striking out a Kolbe Cathedral batter for number 600.

And right there to cheer Cathy on was her sister, Sam, who made sure she was in attendance for the record breaker.

“I’m so proud of her. She’s like my best friend and she works so hard,” Sam said.

Both sisters credit their early days of playing softball in California for their success. Out West, the softball season is much longer and the players only get that much better. Also, there was always advice to go around, especially from mom, who happens to coach the Carmel, N.Y., high school softball team.

The Byrne family moved to Newtown in 1991 and took the softball community by storm. Between 1994 and 2000, the Byrne sisters pitched just about every inning of softball, a total of nearly 150 games.

Sibling rivalry? Not when it comes to softball, that’s for sure.

While Sam, now 21, used a blazing fastball to break the record, Cathy, 19, relied on her curve ball and pinpoint control. In the end, both styles worked well as the Byrne sisters are remembered for having the two greatest arms in NHS softball history.