In what head coach Jessica Lynn considered their most complete outing of the season, the Brownwood Lady Lions wrapped up the first half of District 6-4A softball action with a crucial 6-1 home victory over the Stephenville Honeybees Tuesday night.
The win – the second in a row for the Lady Lions (6-11-1, 2-2) following a stretch of nine losses in 10 games – pulls Brownwood into a second-place tie with Stephenville (9-12, 2-2) and Lampasas (11-10, 2-2) midway through the league slate.
“I hate to say this was a must-win with half of district to play, but it was because we didn’t want to fall too far behind Stephenville and Lampasas in the standings,” said Lynn, whose team inched significantly closer to a 17th straight postseason berth. “The girls stepped up to the challenge and played aggressively and confidently which we hadn’t seen in a whole game in district yet. I’m hoping this is a turning point for them.”
Annie-Klein Allgood turned in perhaps her best performance in the pitching circle this season, surrendering just one run on four hits with five strikeouts, three walks and eight base runners left stranded.
“Her ball looked like it was moving really well,” Lynn said of Allgood. “Getting soft contact is the type of pitcher she is and you could tell she wasn’t leaving the ball over the plate because it wasn’t getting hit hard. She was doing what she wanted and looked very confident and relaxed out there and that was really good to see. I thought our defense did a great job behind her. We did a good job coming together today.”
The lone run yielded to Stephenville – which is coached by Early High graduate Parker Smith – came in the top of the third inning on an RBI ground out by Jaylee Matthews that drove in Katie McIrvin, who led off the inning with a walk. By that point, the Lady Lions had already put five runs on the scoreboard.
Brownwood took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first as Mia Lopez drew a one-one walk, moved to second on Allgood’s base hit and scored on an RBI ground out to shortstop by Auzzlyn Benedict.
The Lady Lions then erupted for four runs in the second inning to seize control of the contest. With one out Mackenzie Welch walked and Chelsey Covey followed with an infield single. With two down, Welch scored on a wild pitch ahead of a single by Chesney Covey. Lopez then delivered a two-RBI single up the middle to knock in both Coveys, while Lopez later came home when Allgood reached on a ball dropped by the center fielder.
Brownwood scored once more in the sixth inning as Allgood reached on a dropped ball by the second baseman, and Benedict followed with a fly ball to right-center field that was also dropped.
The Lady Lions finished with seven hits as a team and overcame three errors in the field.
“We still made a couple of errors on defense, but they went after each play with more confidence and weren’t as hesitant,” Lynn said. “We’ve been preaching that if you make an error mistakes happen, we just can’t let another error come after that. The next person the ball gets hit to has to make that play and pick up that player and back up the pitcher and we did a very good job of that tonight.”
The Lady Lions begin the second half of 6-4A action at 6:30 p.m. Friday when they host district front-runner Glen Rose (16-3, 4-0) – a 15-4 winner over Gatesville (5-17-1, 0-4) Tuesday.
