by Alan Hoskins, KCKCC
Stung by a frustrating 6-5 loss in the first game, Kansas City Kansas Community College rebounded with a 10-2 nightcap win that took just five innings at Cottey College in Nevada, Mo., Wednesday.
The split sends the Blue Devils (10-8) into a pair of home weekend doubleheaders. A doubleheader with Independence is scheduled at noon Saturday. A doubleheader with Cowley College is scheduled at 1 p.m. Sunday.
The Blue Devils pounded out 15 hits in both games at Cottey only to have three errors open the door for five unearned runs in the 6-5 opening loss. They also left nine runners stranded but took no such chances in the nightcap by scoring seven runs in the fifth inning of the 10-2 win.
“Much better effort in the second game,” KCKCC coach Kacy Tillery said. “We pitched well, played defense and hit well.”
Allison Kasick, a freshman from Basehor-Linwood, continued her torrid hitting, pounding out six hits and driving in seven runs in the two games. Kasick rapped her fifth home run of the season and singled in the opener and then drove in five runs in the second game with two doubles and two singles.
KCKCC led just 3-1 in the second game before the 7-run fifth inning highlighted by eight hits including six in a row. Singles by Kasick and Mikaela Hoffart started the inning and after two outs, Candice Jennings doubled and Sam Sudac, Grace Grosvenor, Kaylynn Stratton and LaTisha Thomas all singled before Kasick closed out the inning with a 3-run double.
The Blue Devils took a 1-0 lead in the first on singles by Stratton and Kasick and a home run by Jennings triggered a 2-run second inning that also included doubles by Sudac and Stratton, each of whom had three hits in the contest. Shannon Green went the 5-inning distance for the win, allowing four hits, striking out four and walking two.
Sophomore pitcher Megan Sumonja had a home run and two singles in the opener but took the loss despite giving up only one earned run. She struck out seven and walked seven. The Blue Devils, meanwhile, had runners on base in every inning but stranded nine.
Cottey never trailed in the opener, scoring two runs in each of the first two innings and taking a 6-3 lead with two more runs in the fourth. KCKCC closed to 6-5 in the fifth on Kasick’s home run following a single by Thomas.
Sumonja’s home run cut KCKCC’s deficit to 2-1 in the second and the Blue Devils got two more runs in the third on bases-loaded singles by Amy-Grace Wilson and Stringer. The Blue Devils’ 15-hit attack included two hits each by Stratton, Kasick, Wilson, Stringer and Taylor Hall and three by Sumonja.