While bragging rights were on the line in Friday’s softball game between cross-town rivals Boerne High and Boerne Champion, both coaches said the rivalry took a back seat to just winning the game in hopes of keeping their playoff chances alive.
In the bigger picture, the Chargers and Greyhounds are on the bubble and need strong finishes if they are going to make the postseason and any wins at this point are important.
In the end, it was the Lady Greyhounds that helped their chances the most with an 8-0 shutout of the Lady Chargers.
Boerne has swept the Chargers this year, but BHS head coach Chester Pettibon said it’s all about trying to get into the postseason party more than anything else.
“Today wasn’t much about anything other than we needed a win to stay alive for a playoff spot,” Pettibon said after Friday’s victory.
The Lady Greyhounds are 5-8 in 26-5A and chasing Kerrville Tivy. The Lady Antlers are in fourth place at 7-6 in district and are the only team that the Greyhounds can catch at this point.
BHS is 9-8 overall and hosted Alamo Heights Tuesday. They are off Friday.
Champion has a tougher road ahead and is 4-8 in district. The Chargers are 6-9 overall and visited Pieper on Tuesday. They host New Braunfels Friday.
Chargers coach Sara Cammer said they need a strong finish.
“If we can win three of our next four, we could still have a chance,” she said. “We just have to focus on our game and make adjustments on both offense and defense to be successful.”
Boerne has a penchant for coming on strong late in games but on Friday, the Lady Hounds used a fast start instead to take control. BHS’s first batter, Ava Renteria, tripled, to start things off.
From there, Boerne tallied four straight singles and was up 3-0 before the Lady Chargers had even batted.
Pettibon said it was something they talked about.
“In the last few games, we haven’t come alive until the last half of the game and we said we need to start scoring at the beginning of the game and give ourselves a chance at the end,” he said. “That was our focus all week, coming out swinging and hitting the ball early.”
Boerne added 3 more runs in the top of the fourth. Singles from Maddie Vasquez and Breanna Krause, followed by doubles from Brooklynn Thomason and Lizzy Thornton helped the Lady Hounds open up a 6-0 lead. Three of those hits came with two outs.
Champion had chances to score and had the bases loaded with one out in the fifth, but BHS turned a double play to end the threat.
Boerne also turned a double play in the bottom of the sixth to get out of another jam.
Cammer said they didn’t score in the game because they didn’t adjust at the plate.
“When you see the same pitcher two to three times, you have to adjust every at bat and they didn’t make those adjustments,” she said.
Renteria doubled to start the top of the sixth and moved to third on a sac bunt by Krause. Thomason singled to score Renteria and later scored after swiping second and third and then coming home on a passed ball for the 8-0 lead that held up until the end.
BHS finished with a dozen hits and were led at the plate by Renteria who tripled, doubled and singled and scored twice.
Champion finished with 6 hits and was paced by Mylie Parker who had 2 of the hits, while Aidan Kavanagh doubled.
Parker went 5.1 innings in the circle and walked 1 and struck out 2, while Anna Hurst finished up in the circle.
Jesseanna Aguirre was the winning pitcher on 88 pitches and struck out 5 against 2 walks.
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