| Assistant coach Elise Curtis tells Chantelle Benson great job on a catch. |
As the second half of the region softball season begins, the Emery High Lady Spartans and the Carbon High Lady Dinos find themselves in a play-off fight with the Delta Rabbits for the final two spots in region that will send teams to the state playoffs in three weeks.
With Juan Diego and North Sanpete having clinched play-off spots, for all intents and purposes, Delta has won two region games and Carbon and Emery one each as the week began as these three will battle for the right to travel north for play-off games.
Last week on the Spartan home field, Emery and Carbon split a double header to keep the race interesting. Emery won the opener 7-2 before losing the second game 6-3.
In the opening game, Leslee Lake pitched a complete game to get the win. With good stuff all day, she kept the Dinos off balance and never let them get anything started. The Dinos had 6 hits in the game while 7 batters struck out and only 1 Dino gathered a walk. Carbon scored a run in the fourth inning on 2 base hits and a throwing error and their second run in the sixth inning on a homerun by Norton.
The Spartans scored in each of the first four innings before being shutout in the final two innings. In the first inning, Chantelle Benson led off the game being hit by a pitch, went to second base on a single by Lacey Montgomery and scored on a fielder’s choice by Chelsea Skinner.
In the second inning, Lacey Erickson singled, advanced to second on a wild pitch and scored on a wild pitch. In the third inning, Benson got on base due to a walk and scored on a double by Brandee Wilson. Wilson was the final out of the inning as she tried to advance to third base on her hit.
In the fourth inning, Emery added 4 runs to really take control of the game. After a strikeout, Erickson singled, Kassie Allred got on base as the right fielder dropped her hit, Bailey Kay singled and Adriane Weihing singled. All four would score as Montgomery singled and Skinner would walk.
In the second game, Malorie Quick started on the mound and breezed her way through the first five innings giving up no runs on only 2 Carbon hits. She also gave up no bases on balls. In the sixth inning, the Dinos finally found some hits in their bats as the first three batters up got base hits. Emery made a pitching change with Lake coming back to the mound and the bases loaded and no outs. Lake struck out the first batter that she faced to buoy Emery’s hopes but things quickly deteriorated as the next four batters singled. Some of the hits were bunts and some were hits because they got through a pulled in infield, but all got on base and when the next two batters flew out, six Dinos had crossed the plate.
Emery scored a single run in each of the third, sixth and seventh innings. In the third inning, Kay got on base because of a Carbon error and would score on a single by Benson. Weihing also had a single in the inning to advance Kay to third base.
In the sixth inning, Montgomery was hit by a pitch and Skinner singled. After two Emery batters got out, Erickson got a base hit to score Lacey and Skinner was thrown out at the plate to end the inning.
Emery had one final shot to win. In the seventh inning, Kay again got on base because of a Carbon error as an outfielder dropped a fly ball. Weihing and Benson singled to score Kay and Emery was thinking that they could do it. After an out on a fly ball, Carbon ended the comeback by picking off an Emery base runner trying to advance.
With the win, Carbon now has the tiebreaker with the Spartans for the season if they end up tied in region play as they have won two of three games. Emery will host North Sanpete in a single game on Tuesday and then will host Delta in a double header on Thursday.