When the rain started to fall Tuesday the runs started to pour. Unfortunately for the Kahok softball team, O’Fallon’s bats were a little more potent, carrying them to a 12-9 win over Collinsville.
Jessica Ledford / Photo by Roger Starkey
Each team scored first-inning runs, but O’Fallon (1-0 Southwestern Conference, 8-3) started to pull away in the second. Pitcher Addison Barnouski led off the inning with a double and scored on an error, to make it 2-1 O’Fallon. Allison Sphilman followed the error with a double to the wall in the left center.
Addison Wickiser replaced Kahoks’ starting pitcher Caitlyn Brombolich following the Sphilman double. Sami Stadts reached Wickiser for a two-out bases loaded single to push the Panther’s edge to 4-1 after two innings.
The rain started to fall in the top of the fourth, with Collinsville (0-1 SWC, 4-1) trailing 5-2. The Panthers loaded the bases with one out following a walk, a chopper over the third basemen’s head and a tapper back to the mound that Wickiser had to put in her pocked because she had no play.
Taylor underwood followed with a run scoring single. A second run scored when the Kahoks threw out a runner that had advanced to third, which already had a runner on it. The run that scored on the 9-2-5-6 put out gave O’Fallon a 7-2 lead. Consecutive RBI singles and a wild pitch gave the Panthers a seemingly insurmountable 10-2 advantage.
The Kahoks responded in a big way in the fifth, sending 11 players to the plate and scoring seven, two-out runs. Jessica Ledford, Alex Holten, Samantha Buettner, Becky Gibbs, Sarah Scrum, Sidney Bost and Audrey Allard each scored a run for Collinsville. Although the lead was cut to 10-9, O’Fallon Interim Head Coach Kelly Paproth said she believed her team would hold the lead.
“I was not scared, Paproth said. “I had full confidence in our girls that we were going to pull through on that one.”
The Panthers answered by pounding back-to-back doubles to start the sixth to increase the lead to 11-9. Following an error, two strike outs and a walk, Wickiser issued a bases loaded walk to provide the final score, 12-9.
Kahoks Head Coach Cindy Kolda found something positive in the loss.
“Today was a good learning day for some of my girls,” Kolda said. “Wickiser, going out in these conditions, I can’t say that she didn’t walk away from this learning something. It’s April 1, so we’ve got time for that to help us out in the long run.”
Collinsville plays its second of seven games in six days this week when it host Breese Mater Dei at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday.
