Bats silent when needed

Offense finally came for the Patriots in the fifth inning.

When they needed it again, they weren’t able to string much together.

The Jay County High School softball team tied the game with four runs in the fifth inning but as it fell behind an inning later it wasn’t able to keep the offense going in a 7-4 loss to the New Castle Trojans on Monday.

“They come and played hard,” said JCHS coach Trisha Green, whose team is in the midst of a stretch of 11 games in 11 days. “It’s hard to win when you only score one inning. (New Castle pitcher Madi Moffitt) threw a great curveball. We couldn’t get our bats going. We’d get someone on then we wouldn’t score them.

“Just took us a while to come alive, then we couldn’t fight back.”

Down 4-0 heading into the bottom of the fifth inning, Jay County (10-5) was finally able to string together some offense to break the shutout.

Riah Champ, who earlier had to be taken out after going head first into the fence in right field attempting to catch a foul ball, started things off for the Patriots with a single. After a fielder’s choice, Mady Fraley doubled to score Champ, and after another out Rieley Brewster hit an RBI single.

Renna Schwieterman singled through the right side for her third hit of the day before Olivia Bright blooped a two-run double into shallow right field.

“Momentum,” Green said of what was the difference in the fifth inning as compared to the previous four. “They get fired up. They had some great hits. … She was throwing some curves and I think the girls were just off hitting. It wasn’t a bad game, it just happened.”

An RBI from Kayla Burns and a JCHS error allowed New Castle (5-14) to retake the lead with two runs in the top of the sixth inning, and they added one more in the seventh.

Moffitt, who gave up 10 hits but struck out nine Patriots, only allowed one JCHS baserunner the final two frames.

Jay County stranded two runners in scoring position in the second inning, and left runners at the corners in the fourth.

“We’ve got to get on base,” Green said. “We have to get (hits) together. “You’re going to have games sometime where you just don’t get hits.”

New Castle struck first in the top of the second inning with three consecutive singles. Jay County pitcher Haleigh Clayton almost got out of the jam with back-to-back outs, but a walk with bases loaded brought home the game’s first run.

The Trojans tacked on three more in the second, highlighted by Moffitt’s two-run home run after a leadoff walk. Katie Cooper also had an RBI in the inning.

Clayton allowed seven runs — five earned — on 10 hits. She struck out two and walked a pair.

Bright led the Patriot offense with a double and two singles. Schwieterman collected three singles as well, and Maddy Rinker also singled.

“We’ve got to come back,” said Green, whose team travels to Allen County Athletic Conference rival Southern Wells tonight, hosts other ACAC opponents Bluffton Wednesday and Heritage on Thursday, travels to Wes-Del Friday and plays a doubleheader against Hagerstown on Saturday.

“We have a really long week,” she continued. “We just have to keep going, look forward. There’s nothing we can do about this loss at this point.”



Elwood invite

ELWOOD — After dropping the first game to the host Elwood Panthers, Jay County rebounded by beating the Southwood Knights to finish third in the Elwood Invitational.

The Patriots fell to the Panthers by a 9-4 score, then topped the Knights 6-4.

Brewster was 2-for-2 with a home run and two RBIs against Elwood. Aubrie Schwieterman doubled, singled and scored twice, and Bright had a pair of RBIs too.

Renna Schwieterman hit a two-run home run against Southwood. Bright chipped in three hits while Aubrie Schwieterman tripled, doubled and had two RBIs. Brewster also doubled and singled.