HARROD – The Spencerville softball team traveled to Allen East Monday evening for a Northwest Conference ball game.
Oh, and by the way, they brought their hitting shoes with them.
The Bearcats exploded for 15 runs on 11 hits and seven of those hits were good for extra bases en route to a 15-4 win as Spencerville improved to 6-6 overall, but more importantly 3-0 in league play.
The Bearcats set the tone early as senior shortstop Kara May connected for a two-run home run on the first pitch thrown to her in the top of the first inning. Spencerville would leave the bases loaded in that first inning or the damage could have been much worse.
Allen East starting pitcher Riley Newland looked like she might escape that first inning but two hit batters and a single loaded the bases with two outs and forced Mustangs coach Paul Patton to bring in Chloe Lawrence and Lawrence responded with a strike out to leave the bases loaded.
Lakin Basham homered for Allen East in their first inning to cut the Spencerville lead to 2-1 after one inning of play.
But, the Bearcats added three runs in the second to expand their lead to 5-1 and starting pitcher Julie Mulholland began to settle in.
May, who will play ball at Ohio Northern next year, added her second home run of the game leading off the fourth inning while Allen East also scored once in the bottom of the inning and the score was 6-2 going to the fifth inning.
Spencerville would go on to score four times in the sixth and five more times in the seventh while the Mustangs scored twice in the bottom of the seventh to account for the final score.
May was walked intentionally in both the sixth and seventh inning as Patton (who coaches May in summer ball) had seen enough.
“It frustrates me to a point, but he is my summer coach and I thought he might do that,” May said of the intentional walks. “I always like to have a chance to swing; I don’t look for anything, I just swing.”
Besides the two home runs by May, Bailey Swartz homered and doubled for the Bearcats while Mulholland, Kendra Johnston, and Gracie Butorac all doubled for Spencerville.
“Our bats are waking up and the girls are starting to hit the ball,” Spencerville coach Jeff Johnston said. “We are playing a mix of youngsters and five seniors but we are making progress.”
Both teams committed three errors in the game but the miscues by the Mustangs did more damage.
“We just have to take care of the ball better,” Patton said. “They are a very good team, but, we have to be able to get timely hits.”
Allen East stranded seven base runners in the game as the fell to 8-8 overall and 2-4 in the NWC.
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