|
Durant keeps Bears down in season opener
by Matthew Dickinson, sports editor · Sports · May 28, 2025
West Branch’s softball team put up a good fight against a quality Durant team but fell 9-1 in five innings Monday night on the road.
“We battled,” Bears Head Coach Eric Stenberg said. “I thought our pitcher threw very well. There’s a lot of close pitches that didn’t go our way, and that’s part of softball. We made some really good plays defensively, Karley [Shelton] played well behind the plate. Just a few small things. For a first night out against the team that might be the No. 1 team in the conference, I’m very pleased with how things went.”
After the Bears could not convert a leadoff single by Lander Malloy into a run, the Wildcats scored three times in the home half of the first on a trio of RBI hits. West Branch went down in order in the second, while Durant manufactured a run after reaching base on an error to start the inning before a pair of sacrifice bunts and a passed ball brought the fourth run home.
The Bears responded with their first run of the season in the third. Sulli Bucknell had a leadoff single and advanced to second on a one-out walk by Malloy. Finley Rushton had an infield single, but Bucknell was called out at home on a bang-bang play. Shelton then delivered an RBI single to put West Branch on the board.
Durant answered with an RBI single and a run scored on a passed ball in the home half, while West Branch went down in order to start the fourth. The Wildcats kept adding insurance runs, drawing a quartet of walks to force in a run before reliever Emalyn Poe coaxed a strikeout. The Bears had another three-up, three-down inning before the Wildcats put the Memorial Day game to bed with a two-RBI single.
Poe and Malloy both had admirable efforts on the hill, battling through heavy traffic on the basepaths and avoiding big innings with timely plays.
“It’ll be huge,” Stenberg said of the duo’s success in tight spots. “We essentially have three pitchers, with Tori Vikel being our third one. We have three solid pitchers. I thought Lander pitched really well, she’s markedly improved from last year. And Em comes in and battles every time. She’s always going to throw strikes and battle.”
West Branch also had a sound defensive effort teamwide along with a patient approach at the plate, as the Bears mostly avoided swinging at bad pitches and hitting themselves into outs.
“I see a team that’s maturing and figuring out where the strike zone is and what pitches to swing at,” Stenberg said. “We just want to get pitches, we put the ball in play, which was really nice.”
The Bears would return to action in the friendly confines at West Branch High School on Wednesday for the team’s home opener against non-conference opponent Central City.
“These kids are focused and we’re doing a good job, and on Wednesday it’ll be a better night,” the coach said.
1 2 3 4 5 T
WB 0 0 1 0 0 1
Dur 3 1 2 1 2 9
West Branch statistics n/a
Durant statistics n/a
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
