Months of hard work and never giving up finally paid off for the Lady Panthers softball team today as they won their first game of the season in their last double header of the year. Westminster and Prin split the double header with Prin winning game 1 by a score of 9-6 and then Westminster won game 2, 7-1. This was also the first double header where both games went 7 innings.
Game 1 did not have the best of starts with Prin giving up 3 runs in the 1st inning and 2 more in the 4th. Prin's bats started to show some life in the 5th inning where they picked up 2 runs and then in the 6th the team erupted for a season high 7 runs to take the lead. The team's defense got the job done in the final 2 innings keeping Westminster to only 1 run to finish with a well deserved 9-6 win.
Tavia Patterson,
Marina Whitney and Jess Dunlap each had 2 hits and scored a run.
Marianna Distel and
Bekah Charlston both had a hit and a run while
Jocelyn Shoemake had 3 walks and scored a run.
Game 2 had no resemblance to game 1 unfortunately. The team seemed unable to put forth the same intense effort of game 1 and quickly found themselves in trouble giving up 3 runs again in the 1st inning. The perseverance that allowed them to come from behind in game 1 and win wasn't there for game 2. The team's only hit came from
Andie Raffles and its only run came from
Lucia Rooker after she got on base on a walk.
All in all it was a good way to end the season. The team played its best game of the year in the 1st game of the double header and finally got a well earned win. This team has faced a ton of challenges but just kept moving forward. They have improved a lot from the beginning of the season and were often inspiring to watch.
