The Sweet Home High School Huskies won four of five games last week, ending the week with a 4-3 victory at home against Yamhill-Carlton on Saturday.
Monday and Tuesday last week, they played in the four-game Medford Spring Classic, winning three of four games.
Against Yamhill-Carlton, the Huskies were missing Ally Tow, Cochran said. “She’s one of our key players in the outfield and the batting lineup.”
The team has several key girls who can impact the team’s performance if they’re missing, he said. “That just means all the other girls have got to step it up a notch.”
It also means several girls will play out of position, he said.
That said, the Huskies played well, he said. “They came together as a team and ran the bases really well.”
They’ve been working on running bases, and it paid off Saturday, Cochran said.
Marissa Kurtz made two key catches in left field running down fly balls for the outs.
Britney Zook made some good catches at shortstop, Cochran said. “The end of the game, she made an outstanding running catch on a line drive pop-up behind her.”
The Huskies took the lead scoring two runs in the third inning. They added another in the fourth to lead 3-0. Yamhill-Carlton scored a pair of runs in the top of the fifth, but the Huskies answered with another run. Yamhill-Carlton managed one more run in the top of the sixth to trail 4-3.
At bat, Sunhee Bitter and Sarita Zanona each had a pair of hits, Bitter with a double and Zanona with an RBI. Makena Melbye hit a triple, with an RBI, and Madi Barringer singled. Kennedi Waldrop collected an RBI.
Pitching, Brianna Hoffman threw a complete game, giving up three hits and two walks while striking out two Yamhill-Carlton batters.
For Yamhill-Carlton, Emily Lockhart gave up six hits and a walk, striking out seven Huskies.
At bat, Matia Elllis hit a double, and Ember Armstrong hit a homerun for Yamhill-Carlton.
Earlier in the week, the Huskies lost 4-3 to Marshfield in their opening game at the Medford tournament.
“We probably should’ve won it,” Cochran said. “We were a little bit flat. We played good. Our base running needed a little work done. We didn’t run the bases very good, and that contributed to the loss.”
Overall, it was a good tournament, Cochran said. Sweet Home won under the 10-run rule in its next two games, 17-7 against South Umpqua Monday and 17-0 against Klamath Union on Tuesday.
They defeated Brookings Harbor 13-6 Tuesday.
While there, they got a look at Elmira, their toughest league rival. Elmira won four games, all of them by more than 10 runs. The Huskies are scheduled to open league play on April 4 at Elmira.
“We watched them a little bit,” Cochran said. “Our defense is just as good if not better than theirs. It’s just going to boil down to if we can hit their pitcher.
“We’re going to have to work on hitting and when we meet Elmira on the fourth there, we’ll have to hit the ball well.”
The Huskies are scheduled to host Stayton on Wednesday and then head to Marshfield for a doubleheader on Saturday.
The Huskies are 5-1 overall.
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