Huntland's Hadley Gardner connects on a pitch during a game Friday at Eagleville High School. Gardner had a home run, a walk, four RBIs and a stolen base in the 19-4 loss.
Huntland's Hadley Gardner connects on a pitch during a game Friday at Eagleville High School. Gardner had a home run, a walk, four RBIs and a stolen base in the 19-4 loss.
The Huntland High School Lady Hornets lost to the Eagleville Lady Eagles 19-4 on the road Friday for their fifth loss of the season.
An early exit from starting pitcher Bella Smith due to an apparent injury forced the Lady Hornets to dig into their pitching reserves, and the Lady Eagles took advantage by scoring early and often before the district contest ended after four innings.
Huntland head softball coach Michael Tipps said his pitching staff did a good job of limiting Eagleville’s offense on balls in play, but a large number of walks and hit batters were too much to overcome.
“We were one or two pitches away in a couple of innings of having a strikeout and it turned into a walk. The runs just started adding up after a while,” he said. “I don’t think (Eagleville) had but three more hits than we did. The difference was just too many walks.”
Smith was hit by the ball on her throwing arm after taking a check swing on an inside pitch in the top of the first. She remained in the game for that at-bat and ultimately struck out.
Hadley Gardner, Jocy May and Blair Finchum drew two-out walks later in the frame to load the bases, but a line drive from Camerin Davis went right to Eagleville’s right fielder to end the scoring threat.
Smith pitched to five batters in the bottom of the first and recorded one out before the decision was made to pull her from the game as a precaution. The Lady Eagles went on to score five total runs in the frame to take an early 5-0 lead.
The Lady Hornets loaded the bases again in the top of the second on a single by Emily Stewart and walks drawn by Bailey Morris and Peyton Counts, and Gardner then launched a grand-slam home run to straightaway center field to make it a 5-4 game.
However, the Lady Eagles scored four runs each in the second and third innings while collecting just one total hit across the two frames to boost their lead up to 13-4.
The Lady Eagles then put the game out of reach with a six-run fourth inning to trigger the mercy rule as the Lady Hornets lost by 15.
Smith ended the day with one hit allowed, one walk issued and three runs allowed from the pitching circle.
Morris pitched the next 2 1-3 innings with two strikeouts, two hits, seven walks, seven earned runs and two unearned runs allowed.
Analyn Riddle followed with two outs recorded, two hits allowed, six walks issued and six runs allowed out of the bullpen. May pitched to three batters in relief and had one hit and one run allowed for the day.
With the loss, the Lady Hornets moved to 4-5 on the season and 2-2 in district play.
They will next play Monday at Moore County High School. First pitch is scheduled for 6 p.m.
