by Alan Hoskins, KCKCC
Hutchinson picked the wrong Lady Blue Devil to challenge in the opening game of a doubleheader at Kansas City Kansas Community College Saturday.
Trailing 5-2 heading into the bottom of the seventh, the Blue Devils tied the game on clutch doubles by Hannah Bishop and Allison Kasick. With two out, Hutchinson decided to intentionally walk Mikaela Hoffart and Katherine Stringer foiled the strategy by rifling a line-drive single to right-center for the game-winner in a 6-5 win.
However, it was the Conquistadors who had the big inning in the second game, wiping out a 2-1 deficit with seven runs in the sixth inning for an 8-6 win. The split left the Blue Devils 14-16 heading into three straight twin bills this week – at Neosho County Tuesday, Allen County Wednesday and Southeast in Beatrice, Neb., Thursday.
Limited to just three hits and trailing 5-2 going into the bottom of the seventh of the opener, the Blue Devils charged from behind on back-to-back one-out singles by LaTisha Thomas and Kaylynn Stratton. Bishop made it 5-4 with a 2-run double and Kasick doubled in the tying run and set up Stringer’s game-winning hit,
The rally made a winner out of reliever Megan Mason, who came on with two on and none out in the seventh and pitched out of a bases-loaded situation. Megan Sumonja pitched the first six innings, allowing five runs, only three of which were earned. KCKCC’s other two runs came in the fifth on two walks and a Bishop single.
Shannon Greene allowed only three hits and one unearned run the first five innings in the second game only to have eight straight Conquistadors reach base in the sixth inning, seven on base hits to take an 8-2 lead before Mason ended the uprising.
KCKCC jumped in front 2-0 in the first on a single by Bishop, hit batsman and a 2-run double by Hoffart but managed only one more single until the sixth, when singles by Grace Grosvenor, Stringer and Candice Jennings made it 8-3.
The Blue Devils tried to mount another last-inning rally in the seventh, scoring three times. Singles by Thomas and Stratton and a double by Kasick scored two runs and Hoffaart singled in the third before Hutch’s Holly Kelley left the tying run in the on-deck circle.