Hawks Lose to Lytle, 6-5
Hawks lost their first game on Saturday to the Lytle Pirates, 6-5 ending their tournament chances
Freshman Cameron Berger
of advancing to play more games.
Don’t take this wrong, but winning all your games in a tournament is not the reason why these games are scheduled. Simply put, it is for repetition for these players as they prepare for district games.
Yes, a win would of been even better, but Coach Gallagher is after a bigger goal than winning all these games. Gallagher is in evaluation mode.
CL did have a chance to win this game and might have pulled it out if the ‘time’ limit would not have stopped action. But losing a five inning affair would give the Coaches plenty of data to look at to see what they might want to do when the real season starts.
Case and point was an at bat by Freshman Cameron Berger in the top of the 5th inning.
After Kelsey Ahrens reached base on an error on the Pirate center fielder, Canyon Lake had coaxed a runner (Sharon Alexanders) to third base but two of the next two batters had struck out.
Enter Berger to the plate with two outs and the Hawks needing a run. After two pitches and two strikes, Berger was in a hole.
Berger fouled off four pitches and three others that were called balls and that had finally worked the count full. Each pitch had a lot of drama packed in as ‘staying alive’, an old Bee Gees hit, could be a song used to state what needed to happen to keep the game going.
After finally getting a pitch she could handle, Berger induced a sharply hit grounder to short stop which was mishandled and an error would allow Alexander to score on the play.
That was a huge play for any player much less a Freshman trying to do as much in her power to keep the game going.
“It was nerve racking,” Berger commented after asked about how she handled her at bat. “I knew I had to focus on each pitch and it is a good confidence boost.”
This one at bat was a marathon lasting a good five minutes and an end result that would make Coaches happy even in a loss.
Softball is a series of plays and each one can build or fall based on how each player performs in that given situation.
This was a good sign to see as you also had Alexander also gliding across the base paths that she starts to look like a stealth runner.
A young team that lost a game, but in time these plays are what will eventually end up being those building blocks to wins when the winning counts.
“We fought hard,” Head Coach John Gallagher finished. “We have to learn to cut down on those errors during critical times. We wasted a pretty good pitching outing and were just out of sync.”
Canyon Lake will play again this Tuesday (yes the schedule mentions Monday) because this game with Hyde Park has been switched, so don’t be caught napping and miss this home game.
The Junior Varsity will start at 5:15 followed at 7pm with the Varsity.
1 2 3 4 5 R H E Hawks 0 3 1 0 1 5 6 3 Pirates 0 2 2 1 1 6 6 4 LOB- LP-4, CL- 6. SB- Liz Henderson (1), Vicky Henderson (1). E- V. Henderson (1), L. Daily (1), B. Hemphill (1).
name ip r h bi 2b bb so misc Alexis Robinson 3 0 2 1 0 0 1 McKenna Beseda 3 0 2 0 0 0 0 roe Lilimae Daily 3 0 2 0 0 0 0 Kelsey Ahrens 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 fc, roe pr Liz Henderson 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 sb Brianna Young 1 0 0 0 0 2 1 pr Sharon Alexander 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 Tiare Kacir 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 sac, roe ph Cassidy Riccio 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 Lillie Sander 2 0 0 0 0 0 2 ph Cameron Berger 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 roe Briann Hemphill 3 0 0 0 0 0 1 Vicky Henderson 1 1 0 0 0 1 1 sb Totals 22 5 6 1 0 4 7
Pitching ip h r er bb so np Alexis Robinson 4.1 6 6 3 0 7 93 hpb- Robinson (2). WP- Robinson (2). PB- Young (1). Pitches Balls/Strikes: Robinson 35/58.
