Lady Pioneers close season with 13-3 win
ROGERSVILLE — West Greene ended the regular season with an emphatic 13-3 victory in six innings over visiting Bentworth Wednesday afternoon in non-section softball action at Rice Energy EQT Park.
The season finale was a playoff tune-up for both squads with the postseason brackets set to be released later today.
West Greene finished tied for first place with Monessen in Section 2-A and will likely to grab the top seed in Class A.
“This was a good tune-up for us,” West Greene coach Billy Simms said. “We always try to get Bentworth on the schedule every year because they are a fundamentally sound team. We took advantage of some of their errors and we ran the bases extremely well today.”
Bentworth finished third in Section 3-AA behind Frazier and Chartiers-Houston.
“We gave them some extra runs and we made a couple of mistakes out there on the field,” Bentworth coach Jack Cramer said.
“You can’t give a good team like West Greene those extra runs. They took full advantage of our miscues, like good teams do. This was a tune-up and we will definitely learn from our mistakes.”
After both teams were held scoreless in the opening two innings, the Lady Pioneers (16-4) cracked the scoreboard with three runs in the bottom of the third.
Jersey Wise and Linzee Stover reached base and would later score on a pair of wild pitches. Jade Renner added a two-out, RBI single to stretch the lead to 3-0.
West Greene tacked on five more runs in the bottom of the fourth. Wise crossed home plate on a passed ball and Stover scored on an infield error. Renner slashed a two-run single later in the inning, followed by a run-producing hit from Kaitlyn Rizor.
“We put pressure on defenses with our speed and our base running,” Simms said. “We always preach having your head up and paying attention to the ball. We look pretty good on the bases. Good base running usually extends a big inning.”
The Lady Bearcats (10-6) responded in the top of the fifth with three runs on five hits.
Jessica Rothka, Emilie Snyder and Leah Lindley collected RBI singles to cut the deficit to 8-3.
“We got some hits and I really liked our approach on offense,” Cramer said. “They have a really good pitcher and we were able to string some hits together. We face some tough pitchers in our section, and I think our offense will have to carry us in the playoffs.”
The Lady Pioneers plated four runs to extend their lead to 12-3 in the bottom of the fifth inning.
Stover scored on an errant pickoff throw to third base after a stolen base, while Madison Lampe registered a RBI single and later scored on an infield error. Lexie Mooney capped the scoring in the inning with a sacrifice fly.
After Bentworth went down in order in the top of the sixth, West Greene invoked the 10-run mercy rule when Lampe hammered an RBI double, the lone extra-base hit of the game, that scored pinch-runner Brianna Amos.
Renner, who finished with a team-high three hits, was the winning pitcher, going six innings and allowing three runs on nine hits with three strikeouts and no walks on 81 pitches.
Lindley was tagged with the loss for the Lady Bearcats and exited the game in the bottom of the fourth. Kaylie Anderson pitched the remainder of the game for the visitors.
The Lady Pioneers will enjoy the next couple of days before heating things back up for the playoffs and starting their chase for a third straight WPIAL title.
“It will actually be nice to have a practice,” Simms said. “We been trying to get all of our games in the last week-and-a-half. We really haven’t had a lot of practices. You can only do so much in games to teach the kids. It be nice to cool things down and to work on a couple of fun drills. We will work on our base running and some situational things.”