Mineral County softball didn’t get off on the right foot they wanted in the El Capitan softball tournament they hosted last weekend.
The Lady Serpents went 1-4 in the two day tourney losing to Lone Pine twice, taking a loss at the hands of Virginia City 16-2, but splitting a pair of games with 2A Silver State, winning the first one 30-17, and losing the second meeting 11-0.
In the first game on Friday morning of the tournament, Mineral County watched the game slip away early and couldn’t recover in a 23-1 loss to Lone Pine on Friday. Lone Pine scored on a single by Mia Quezada, an error, and a fielder’s choice by Djenna Garnotel in the first inning.
The Serpents struggled to put runs on the board and had a tough time defensively containing Lone Pine, giving up 23 runs.
The big blow came when the Eagles scored 14 runs in the third inning, when Lone Pine collected five singles and Mineral County helped the Eagles cause by committing six errors, Alexa Inman gave up four walks, hit one batter, struck out seven and walked five.
Inman and Raeane Johnson all had one hit to lead Mineral County Serpents.
Lone Pine tallied 13 hits on the day. Dominique Enriquez, Alvarado, Quezada, and Gutierrez each collected multiple hits for Lone Pine.
Betzy Alvarado took the victory on the mound in game two. She went just three innings as the game was called after the third inning due to the 15-run rule.
Lone Pine totaled 13 hits. Dominique Enriquez, Kayla Daughtry, Alvarado, Djenna Garnotel, and Mia Quezada each managed multiple hits for Lone Pine. Lone Pine was surehanded in the field and didn’t commit a single error. Unfortunately, the Serpent gals committed seven fielding errors.
The second game on Friday for Mineral County was with longtime rival Virginia City. But the Muckers prevailed with a 16-2 victory.
Mineral County scored a run in the top of the first, but the Muckers countered with two runs in their half of the inning, They added four more in the second inning. But the major blow that shortened the game to just three innings was the 10 runs the Muckers got in the bottom of the third inning when six girls each had RBIs in that inning.
Mineral County lost the game, despite out-hitting the Muckers 3-2.
Saturday morning was a different story for the Lady Serpents as they faced Silver Stage. This was a real scoring fest with Mineral County coming out on top 30-17, for their first win of the season. Silver Stage scored 10 runs in the first inning, but Mineral County countered with 16 in the bottom half of the first inning.
Silver State tacked on five more runs in the second inning closing the score to 16-15, but the Serpents rallied for 14 more runs in the bottom of the second to up the lead to 30-15 and that was just too much for Silver Stage to make up, so the game was called after three innings by the 15-run rule. No stats were posted for this game, although surprisingly Mineral County scored on those runs on just eight hits and Silver Stage had only three hits.
The girls had two more games on Saturday, and in both the suffered shutouts, first 21-0 to Lone Pine as the Eagles opened the scoring with 11 runs in the first inning and added more in the Next two innings while Mineral County was held hitless and scoreless until the game was called after three innings, again by the 15- run rule.
The Lady Serpents final game on Saturday at the tournament was a rematch with Silver Stage, and this time the Nighthawks prevailed again with an 11-0 victory.
