FREMONT – On a night when the Lady Giant pitching and defense played more than well enough to win, Fremont Ross’ bats ran into a buzzsaw.
St. Ursula pitcher Morgan Bowers kept the Lady Giant hitters off balance from start to finish Friday. Bowers allowed just one hit and two walks while striking out 10 in the Arrows’ 6-0 win over the Lady Giants.
“We had a really hard time adjusting,” Ross coach Tony Hill said of Bowers’ pitching. “She throws, I want to say, 95 percent of her pitches were low and outside. If the umpire is calling them, if that’s his zone, then it’s real tough to hit. We adjusted as the game went on, creeping closer and closer to the chalk. They were looking there but it’s one of those things, she’s throwing 65, and whether you know it’s coming or not, it’s hard to hit.”
While the offense struggled, Ross’ defense had one of its best outings of the year. Ross stayed in the game thanks to a quality start by pitcher Morgan Englund and her fielders behind her. The Lady Giants made the plays at crucial times, stranding 10 St. Ursula runners on base. Of the Arrows’ six runs, five came via home run with the remaining run being unearned as a result of the game’t only error in the second inning.
“We’re not going to see Morgan Bowers, or a pitcher like her, every day,” Hill said. “If we play like this yesterday (in a 15-5 loss to Sandusky), it’s 15-5 the other way, maybe worse than that. It’s one of those things we played up to our competition today, but we’re just now quite there.
“We played our butts off. I’d sure like to beat Ursula. …but games like this are going to make us better.”
St. Ursula opened the scoring in the second inning with a solo home run and an unearned run to take a 2-0 lead. But Ross allowed nothing else until a grand slam in the top of the seventh put Ross’ hopes of a late rally out of reach.
Englund had the Lady Giants’ only hit while Kayla Rich and Hailey Taylor worked walks.
“I told (the team), we’re not going to beat them up after this, they played well,” Hill said. “Sometimes you have to tip your cap to the hitters and St. Ursula is a good hitting team.”
The Lady Giants are now 7-13 overall, 3-10 in the TRAC. Ross is off until its sectional tournament game at Whitmer Wednesday at 5 p.m.
| Box score | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | R | H | E | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fremont Ross | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | x | x | 4 | 8 | 0 | ||
| Notre Dame | 4 | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | x | x | 14 | 18 | 1 | ||
| TEAM | AB | R | H | RBI | ||||||||
| Rich | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | ||||||||
| B. Horn | 3 | 2 | 2 | 0 | ||||||||
| Zuniga | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | ||||||||
| Dodson | 2 | 1 | 0 | 1 | ||||||||
| Risch | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
| M. Horn | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | ||||||||
| Logan | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | ||||||||
| Ochs | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
| Taylor | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
| Lenke | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | ||||||||
| Englund | 2 | 0 | 2 | 0 | ||||||||
| TOTALS | 23 | 4 | 8 | 2 | ||||||||
| 2B -- B. Horn | ||||||||||||
| Pitching | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | ||||||
| Englund | 2 | 13 | 10 | 10 | 4 | 1 | ||||||
| Zuniga | 2.1 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 1 |