Headed into play last Friday, it had been 8,037 days since the Wright City girls softball team beat Warren County rival Warrenton.
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Headed into play last Friday, it had been 8,037 days since the Wright City girls softball team beat Warren County rival Warrenton.
Had been, past tense.
That’s because the visiting Wildcats used a 10-run fifth inning as fuel to propel the team to a 13-7 win at Warrenton, marking the first time in 11 games and since September 29, 2004, that the Wildcats have gotten the best of the team’s neighbors to the west.
“This is a big deal,” sophomore catcher Harper Martin said. “It’s my first time beating them in high school. We were out to get them. We played as a team and stayed under control. We did (want to play better).”
The desire to improve the team’s game followed an 8-1 home loss to Warrenton on September 4.
Friday, though, Wright City – and junior pitcher Lorelai Kellner, specifically – weren’t to be denied.
Kellner threw the complete game, striking out 14, which helped her surpass 200 strikeouts for her career, while allowing seven runs on nine hits. Of the 151 pitches she threw, 88 were strikes from Kellner.
“We knew we needed to come ready to play,” said Kellner of the aftermath of the previous defeat. “I told my team that we needed to come locked in before we even stepped on the field. We had to focus during warm-ups and keep our heads up, even after mistakes.”
In the decisive fifth inning, Wright City’s offense was ‘locked in.’
The Wildcats sent 14 hitters to the plate and scored the 10 all-important runs to turn a 3-2 deficit into a 12-3 advantage. The biggest hits of the inning were a two-run double by sophomore Emalee Swor and a two-run triple by Kellner, as eight of the inning’s runs came with two outs.
Wright City Coach Fred Ross said that adjustment was the name of the game for Wright City. From how the Wildcats adjusted to facing Warrenton freshman pitcher Brooklyn Young to their mindset when mistakes happened, Wright City handled its business in the win.
“We did a lot of positive things,” Ross said. “We really adjusted our hitting to what we did the last time against the same pitcher. The girls each did their job. You put the ball in play and good things happen. We made them make some plays and they didn’t make them. We had a couple of lapses but we didn’t have more than one. In the past, with some of those games we played against them, we’d have two or three in an inning.”
In total, Kellner drove in three runs while Swor and junior Joshlynn Hawn drove in a pair each.
Warrenton (4-5) was led by a double and two RBI from junior Lindy Miller.
This weekend, Wright City will compete in the Fort Zumwalt East Tournament while Warrenton is next scheduled to take to the diamond on September 22 at Holt.
