Lady Lions defeat TLCA, Baird, but lose to Eula
By Sam Waller
The Albany Lady Lions split a pair of games last week, but received some bad news as they enter the final two weeks of the softball season.
Albany (15-11-1 overall, 7-1 District 8-2A) beat Baird 21-14 on Tuesday, April 11, in a single game after low numbers led coach Jimmy Fuentes to scale back from the planned doubleheader. Details will be reported next week.
The Lady Lions visit Cross Plains at 5:00 p.m. Friday, April 14 in their second game of the week.
The final week of the regular season will have two road games – Tuesday, April 18 at Cisco and Friday, April 21 at Eula.
Fuentes said this week’s games became more crucial following the loss of a key player that will require reconfiguring the lineup.
“We lost a very major part of our team,” Fuentes said. “We had to go recruit somebody so we could have a team.”
On Tuesday, April 4, Albany lost 5-4 at Eula in a nondistrict game a week after edging the Lady Pirates 1-0. On Friday, April 7, the Lady Lions defeated Abilene TLCA 24-2 in three innings. Freshman Caroline Chapman was added to the roster for the TLCA game after spending most of the spring playing tennis.
“I don’t foresee us picking anybody else up unless somebody is just gracious enough to help us once we get started in the playoffs,” Fuentes said. “Either way, it’s really hard when you’re having to recruit people who haven’t played.”
Against Eula, Braylyn Abbate hit a three-run homer in the seventh to give Albany a 4-3 lead, but Eula rallied with two runs in the bottom of the seventh, scoring the winning run on a passed ball.
All five Eula runs were unearned as Albany had eight errors and four passed balls.
Carisa Barrera had a two-out RBI single in the first before Eula responded with single runs in the first, third, and fifth. In the seventh, Barrera doubled and Gracie Price singled before Abbate connected.
Barerra and Price both went 2 for 3 with Robin Lucas and Abbate going 1 for 3.
Barrera pitched four innings, allowing two unearned runs on one hit. Lucas was charged with three unearned runs on one hit over 2.1 innings.
Fuentes said playing back-to-back one-run games against the same opponent will help in the playoff series.
“We’ll have that experience to lean on, especially for our younger kids,” he said.
At TLCA, Albany struck for 18 runs in the first inning to decide the issue early. The first eight Lady Lions batters reached base and another 10 in a row reached following the first out. Kaisley Bartee made the second out with a squeeze bunt in her third plate appearance of the inning.
In addition to 13 hits, Albany took advantage of 15 walks and five hit batters. Every batter in the lineup scored in the first inning. Haily Cox scored three runs and the next seven scored two each.
“TLCA is still struggling at pitcher,” Fuentes said. “On our end, we took care of business and didn’t play a sloppy ballgame. We got it in, we got it done, and we got it done quick.”
Bartee and Madison Parrott each drove in four runs while Lucas and Gabby Lopez had three RBIs apiece. Lucas went 3 for 3 with Bartee, Lopez and Parrott each getting two hits.
Lucas pitched three innings, striking out six while allowing two unearned runs on one hit.
EULA 5, ALBANY 4
SCORE BY INNING 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 R/H/E
ALBANY 1 0 0 0 0 0 3 4/6/8
EULA 1 0 1 0 1 0 2 5/2/0
atbat runs hits RBI
Cox ss 3 0 0 0
Bartee c 3 0 0 0
Lucas p 3 1 1 0
Barrera 3b 3 1 2 1
Price 2b 3 1 2 0
Abbate 1b 3 1 1 3
Kelly rf 3 0 0 0
Lopez lf 3 0 0 0
Parrott cf 3 0 0 0
Totals 27 4 6 4
2B – Barrera. HR – Abbate. SB – Lucas, Price.
IP H R ER BB SO
Barrera 4 1 2 0 2 5
Lucas 2.1 1 3 0 6 1
PB – Price 2, Bartee 2. HBP – Barrera.
ALBANY 24, ABILENE TLCA 2
SCORE BY INNING 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 R/H/E
ALBANY 18 3 3 x x x x 24/13/1
TLCA 2 0 0 x x x x 2/1/2
atbat runs hits RBI
Cox ss 2 3 1 1
Bartee 3b 2 2 2 4
Lucas p 3 2 3 3
Barrera dp 1 2 0 0
Chapman 2b 1 0 1 0
Price c 1 3 0 2
Abbate 1b 3 2 1 2
Kelly rf 1 4 1 0
Lopez lf 2 4 2 3
Parrott cf 3 2 2 4
Totals 19 24 13 19
2B – Lucas, Abbate, Parrott. HBP – Cox 2, Lopez, Parrott. S – Bartee. SB – Lucas 2, Barrera, Price, Lopez.
IP H R ER BB SO
Lucas 3 1 2 0 4 6
