Lady Black Knights drop home game to Lady T- Birds

Lady Black Knights drop home game to Lady T- Birds

Errors costly as WMCS softball loses to DeSoto at Marion Rose, 5- 2

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A few dropped balls and a missed out at home plate were the difference in the game as the West Memphis Christian Lady Knights lost at home 5-2 to the DeSoto School Lady Thunderbirds. Grace Patterson pitched a solid game but ran into some control problems in the fourth and fifth innings giving up some key singles that pushed home run, but was also not helped by the infield who mishandled a few balls that should have been outs.

“I thought Grace did fine,” said Coach David Horton. “She competed well and gave us a chance. She had a little rough spot in the fourth. But we didn’t help her any. We had a couple of plays that we should have made and pop up hits that we didn’t make. You look at those few plays and pretty much that’s the difference in the ball game.”

Patterson retired the side in the first and managed to keep it scoreless in the second after the visiting Lady Thunderbirds left two runners on base. West Memphis Christian took an early 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second. Kylie Jones beat out an infield single on a 1-2 count then stole second. Jones advanced to third on a wild pitch and was driven in on another infield single by Shelby Vaughan.

“That was a big single,” Horton said. “Shelby did a good job of putting it in play and beating it out. That gave us our first run and gave us a lead.”

Desoto broke the game open though scoring three runs in the fourth then added single runs in the fifth and six innings to make it 5-1.

Despite being down by four, West Memphis Christian made it interesting in their half of the seventh after Piper Farmer led off with a deep drive to center field which went for an inside the park home run to make it 5-2. But that would be all the offense the Lady Knights could muster.

“Piper has been really swinging the bat well for us,” Horton said. “Her average is over .500.”

The loss dropped the Lady Knights record to 3-3 and 0-1 in conference.

West Memphis Christian did pull off a win in the Bgame. The junior varsity squad played two innings and eked out an 8-7 win.

“It was pretty close,” Horton said. “But we ended up scoring last. There was a lot of offense and not much pitching.”

Madison Guest drove in Kylie Johnson for the winning run. “Madison is a first year player. So she is learning the game,” Horton said. “It was pretty exciting for her.” Horton said he was pleased with both efforts but is still trying to instill in the squad that they need to play better defense and make the key outs.

“We need to make those key plays,” Horton said. “That’s what I try to tell the girls. We’re trying to work and get better. The girls understand what we need to do. We just need to bounce back now and play well in the conference games and try to get better on offense and position ourselves for the state tournament.”

The Lady Knights will play their next home game on Aug. 21.

By Mark Randall