NJCAA Division-II No. 9 Kirkwood defeated Iowa Western in both softball games of Friday afternoon’s doubleheader at Gale Wickersham Athletic Complex.
The Eagles defeated the Reivers 6-4 in game one and 14-0 in the second game in just five innings.
“We had a few days off for spring break and we just didn’t compete very well today,” Reivers coach Ben Greer said. “I anticipate we’ll have better days ahead, including tomorrow, but today was the worst day of our season.”
In game one the Eagles struck first with a two-run homer right away in the top of the first inning. Kirkwood would hold a 2-0 lead until the bottom of the 5th inning where Camryn Milley hit a solo homer for the Reivers and Jael Wilde tied the game at 2-2 after hitting a single and stealing second, followed by an RBI single from Myla Beckstrom.
However, the tie wouldn’t last long as the Eagles responded with four runs in the top of the sixth to retake the lead 6-2.
Iowa Western would cut the Eagle lead in half with a pair of runs in the bottom of the sixth and would keep the Eagles scoreless in the top of the seventh, but couldn’t get any girls across home plate to complete the comeback.
“We go down early and fight back and then they rolled out four more runs on us,” Greer said. “We didn’t sharpen things up and when we talk about having a lot of freshman on the field, we were doing a lot of freshman things which made it tough, unfortunately. But that’s just how our team is, we have a lot of freshmen, but eventually, we got to step up.”
Game two started rough for the Reivers from the get-go. The Eagles went on a roll for seven runs in the opening inning and would score a run in the second and third inning as well to take a commanding 9-0 lead.
The Rivers weren’t able to get a base runner until the bottom of the fourth but weren’t able to push anyone home. The Eagles would plate five more runs in the top of the fifth inning to further solidify their lead. The Reivers then went down 1-2-3 to close the game.
“We didn’t compete with the bats, we didn’t compete in the circle, we didn’t compete defensively in this game,” Greer said. “When you go down 7-0 in the first inning you got to find a way to climb that mountain. We didn’t do a very good job of chipping away and truck out 20 times in that game and eight of those were strike-outs looking. They got content with losing which is very unfortunate. So, hopefully, tomorrow is better.”
“I can assure you I’m not going to watch the tape from today. Watching it one time was enough, but we have games against Southeast and Ellsworth tomorrow and Sunday and I hate the word hopefully, but I hope for a better day tomorrow and Sunday.
Iowa Western will look to put this rough day behind them as they return to action on Saturday where they will play against Southeast College at 1 p.m. and Ellsworth at 5 p.m.
Kirkwood 200 004 0 – 6
Iowa Western 000 022 0 – 4
Kirkwood (13-9) 711 05X X – 14
Iowa Western (19-9) 000 00X X – 0
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