The Brownwood Lady Lions scored the final five runs in Tuesday’s District 6-4A softball contest, but the Mineral Wells Lady Rams had built an eight-run cushion and held on for a 9-6 victory and sweep of the two league contests.
The loss continued the roller coaster ride through district for the Lady Lions (13-10, 3-4), who dropped into a three-way tie for third place in 6-4A with Mineral Wells (16-8, 3-4) and Stephenville (11-13-1, 3-4), who Brownwood hosts at 6:30 p.m. Friday before traveling to second-place Graham (9-14, 4-3) next Tuesday and finishing district action at home against first-place Brock (22-0-2, 7-0) on Thursday, April 17.
“We can’t be hot and cold,” said Lady Lions head coach Cherita Munguia. “We really need to win the next two games and I really believe Stephenville is one of the best teams in our district, they’re not a team we can relax against. The girls have to be as hyped as they were last time.”
As for Tuesday’s contest, the Lady Lions grabbed a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning as Kaydence Allen tripled down the right field line with two outs and courtesy-runner Karina Mata scored on a wild pitch that bounced off the front of home plate.
The lead was short lived as Mineral Wells struck for five runs in the top of the third inning, highlighted by RBI singles from Kynlee Harkins and Scottie Denison along with an RBI triple by Emery Boswell.
Mineral Wells padded its cushion to 9-1 in the top of the fifth inning as the first three base runners reached on errors – as Brownwood committed four in the game – and all scored thanks to an RBI sacrifice fly from Boswell, an RBI fielder’s choice from Karli Aaron and an RBI single from Carsyn Presley.
“We looked like we were afraid to make a mistake tonight, which is wild,” Munguia said. “I don’t know if it was because we were coming off a zero-mistake game, thinking if I make a mistake all is going to fall apart, we just didn’t look loose, we didn’t look excited. It looked like we had all the pressure on us tonight.”
Brownwood’s attempted rally began with a run in the bottom of the fifth as Jakayla Peek led off with a walk and scored on Peyton Pena’s RBI triple.
Down 9-2, the Lady Lions tacked on three more runs in the sixth as Chloe Walls led off with a walk, Hanah Campos reached on a one-out free pass, then Tynlea Wilson singled home Walls. Allen followed with a two-RBI single up the middle that scored Campos and Maitlyn Esquivel, running for Wilson, to close the gap to 9-5.
Then in the seventh, Jeniffer Romero led off with a triple down the third base line and scored on Carlee Burks’ RBI ground out, but the rally ran out of steam at that point.
Mineral Wells finished with nine hits off Allen, who stuck out six and walked five in the circle for Brownwood.
In Tuesday’s other district contests, Brock remained atop the league standings with with 10-1 win over Stephenville, and Graham moved into sole possession of second place with a 6-5 triumph over Glen Rose (12-12, 1-5).
