By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
SCIO, Ore.– The Scio Softball team knew that Wednesday’s game was going to be a challenge against Yamhill-Carlton.
The Loggers couldn’t overlook the Tigers. John Kuehnel always has his Tiger players ready to rock and roll, and Yamhill did just that in the two squad’s 3A Special District 3 match-up at Scio High School.
Scio jumped out to a 4-1 lead after the first inning, but couldn’t add to their lead with Yamhill-Carlton making things tough for the Logger offense to turn baserunners into runs over the course of the second and third innings. And Scio did the same in return with their defense, holding the Tigers to that one run until the seventh inning.
By that point, it was 10-1 Loggers when Yamhill-Carlton’s bats came around and put the fire to the feet of Scio to close out the game on this day. Those six runs that turned that 4-1 lead into the 10-1 lead that the Loggers had entering the seventh inning, came over the course of the fourth through sixth innings. It gave Scio that nine-run cushion as they came close to the run-rule to end the game early as well as give their defense an opportunity to breathe.
“That was great. The first inning felt really good. We could’ve done a little bit better in the few other innings. But once we started getting going, I thought we did really well. The bats were hot,” said Scio’s Macy Johnson.
Johnson, Meagan Trissel, and Myleigh Cooper each had multi-hit games in the game. Johnson and Trissel with two each, Cooper with four to lead the Loggers offense. And of those two hits, two went for home runs. One in the fourth inning to get on the board and another in the sixth to book-end the offensive surge that the squad had.
Making those adjustments at the plate was huge points Cooper, who also struck out six pitching. Facing Josie Barker was a task, one of the better pitchers they’ve seen this season, and staying with their approach at the plate.
“Staying with our approach at the plate and keep making adjustments in our at-bats. Not waiting until our second, third, fourth at-bats to make adjustments and for me, to keep staying ahead in the count,” said Cooper.
Yamhill-Carlton had one last stand in them in the seventh inning, proving once again that they couldn’t be slept on as they got baserunners on and began bringing them in. Their rally was short, four runs in total that featured a three-run triple by Addison Tuning and an RBI single by Ceceilia Petraitis, it gave the Loggers a taste of what is to come this league season.
“It really helped us, just for our confidence, that was a big win for us. Our league is really good this year, so getting that win was huge,” starts Johnson. “Getting and playing good competition and seeing really good pitchers really helps us for the games where we may see even better pitchers.”
The Loggers are off until Tuesday when they’ll play Santiam Christian. Yamhill-Carlton will head to play Dayton on Friday.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
