By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
STAYTON, Ore.– The Stayton softball team knew they let one get by them Wednesday afternoon at home against Sweet Home.
The Eagles sat a game ahead of the Huskies for second-place in the Oregon West Conference and were looking to bounce back from their tough 10-0 defeat to their rivals from down the road in Cascade earlier this week. And through the opening three innings of the game, it’ll look as if they were using that game on Monday as motivation for this game against the Huskies.
Stayton led 2-1 after one and settled down after Sweet Home took a 4-2 lead in the top half of the second inning, only for the Eagles to storm back ahead 5-4 thanks to a three-run third inning.
But. that’s when momentum halted for the Eagles. The bats went flat after the bottom of the third inning and Sweet Home kept the ball in play, finding gaps and creating errors that saw the Huskies slowly pull away in what would have become an 8-5 Sweet Home victory in OWC play.
“I really think we really needed to see this adversity. Just being able to learn and regroup as a team… I think it’s really beneficial for all of us,” starts Madden Pfahler. “I think this is a really good alarm for us to wake up and realize we got to work harder and we can’t always come out like the way we’re going to come out, we just have to come out to the best of our abilities.
“Another game for us tomorrow. Fresh start, I think a fresh start and a good talk for all of us is definitely going to be good.”
Kenzie Hollenbeck and Madison Schacher each had two-hit games. Kenzie Beougher struck out seven batters for the Eagles, who will look to get back in the win column Thursday against Newport back at home. The first pitch is at 3:30pm.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
