Lady Vikes stuck in a moment|[10/05/05]
Published 12:00 am Wednesday, October 5, 2005
The Lady Vikes are making it hard for longtime Warren Central coach Lucy Young to get her 400th career win in girls slow-pitch softball.
On Tuesday afternoon, the Lady Vikes had more errors (five) than hits (four) in getting drummed by visiting Cleveland 12-1 in five innings at Lady Vikes Field.
“Here we are at game 26 and I’m at a loss as to what to do with this team,” said Young, a 33-year coaching veteran at WC. “First, you have to bring your heart to the ball game, and then remember your fundamentals. We’ve spent an entire practice, nearly two hours, working on our hitting but then at game time, I’m still trying to explain to them how to hit.”
The loss leaves the Lady Vikes at 16-10 going into Thursday’s final regular season home game with Forest Hill. Warren Central has clinched a playoff spot.
“Maybe we can pick ourselves up for our Senior Day,” Young said. “But the problem we’ve got is we have yet to jell as a unit.”
Cleveland, the Division 3-4A champion, improved to 18-7 after drilling WC for 12 runs off 13 hits. The Lady Wildcats’ top five were a combined 10-for-17.
“The girls who have to hit are doing the hitting but for us to go far in the playoffs, we can’t have automatic outs in the lineup,” Cleveland coach David Price said. “We need our 7-8-9 girls to step up. I was glad to see our No. 10 girl hit the ball three times.”
Kim Sellers had RBI singles in the first and third innings, while Emily Morris belted a triple and a soft-lining single in the third to stake Cleveland to a 5-0 lead.
It was 7-0 in the bottom of the fourth when the Lady Vikes managed to load the bases with one out. But a weak fielder’s choice followed by an infield pop up led to just one run coming home.
Min Kandies keyed a five-run fifth inning with a two-run single to put the game out of reach.
Tatum Griffin led CHS with three hits and drove in three, including two on a double in the fourth. Morris, Kandies and Sellers each had two hits and two RBIs, while Jollee Springer had two hits and scored three runs.
The Lady Vikes were led by Mandy Bordelon with two hits. Shawn Johnson scored the team’s lone run.