MARION – The phrase “better late than never” certainly applies to the Lady Giant softball team.
For the second game in a row, the Lady Giants blew open a close game with a late offensive outburst.
Kayla Rich
Ross sent eight runners across the plate in the top of the sixth inning and scored four more times in the top of the seventh in a 17-6 win over Marion Harding Thursday.
The Lady Giants enjoyed a similar performance last week at Port Clinton scoring 11 runs in the last two innings of a 14-6 victory.
Though he’d certainly rather have his players get their bats going late than not at all, coach Tony Hill is concerned with the time it’s taking his team to find its offense.
“I don’t know what’s taking so long to get adjusted. There is nothing that I can pinpoint. I wish I could,” Hill said. “It’s the most frustrating thing we’ve had to deal with so far this season. Even before we scored eight runs in the sixth inning, we knew we could score runs, it’s just frustrating that it’s taking so long.”
Marion Harding tied the game with a three-run fifth inning, knotting the score at 5-5. That’s when the Lady Giants’ bats got going.
Kayla Rich and Braelyn Horn led off the sixth with base hits before being driven in by a triple by Mekayla Logan to re-take the lead. Later in the inning, Addison Burmeister, Rich and Horn hit back-to-back-to-back doubles to further the offense onslaught.
Braelyn Horn
While the Lady Giants’ scoring outburst was fueled by extra base hits, Ross’ early offense came from playing small ball.
“Of the nine hits our top two (batters) had, I want to say four of them were bunts,” Hill said. “We picked up on Harding not covering with their second basemen. Burmeister had two bunts, Hailey (Taylor) had a bunt. We decided, if we can’t get the bats going we’ll start a rally the easy way and drop one down and get to first.”
Rich went 5-for-6 at the plate with four RBIs and Horn went 4-6 with a pair of runs batted in, each had a pair of doubles. Gabby Zuniga had a double and drove in four runs. Kaylee Dodson, Paige Risch, Taylor, Burmeister and Claire Ochs all had multiple hits.
As a team, Ross collected 22 hits with nine extra-base hits.
The win improves Ross to 2-1 overall as the Lady Giants open TRAC play Friday at Whitmer. Hill sais his team is not going to get away with another late start at the plate.
“We can’t start slow against Whitmer. Whitmer will put us in a hole we won’t be able to get out of. We don’t play from behind very well,” Hill said.
Mekayla Logan
“I hope we’re ready. We haven’t seen any pitching yet like (Whitmer’s) Amanda Combs,” he added. “Maybe we show up tomorrow and surprise everyone. I think Whitmer might be a team that overlooks us. They beat us combined something like 32-2 last year. They’re focused on winning the conference and they’re a little bummed out they didn’t get to play Clay today.
“We’re going to have to play lights-out to beat them.”
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