The Trenton Lady Bulldogs and Putnam County Lady Midgets, the two softball programs that have dominated the Eastern Division of the Grand River Conference for the past four years, met on Saturday morning, both with early-season conference marks of 0-1. In the rescheduling of a rainout from Tuesday, the Lady Midgets took advantage of wild Bulldog pitching in the first inning, scoring four runs, and never trailing in a 6-4 win. The win evens Putnam County’s overall and GRC records at 1-1, after a season-opening 5-4 loss to South Harrison.
The Lady Midgets have a non-conference game on Monday at winless Schuyler County, before continuing GRC action on Tuesday, hosting Gallatin. Trenton, now 1-3 overall, drops to 0-2 in conference play, heading into a Tuesday night home date with Princeton.
In Saturday’s game at Mark Griffin Field, broadcast on KTTN, Lady Bulldog starter Jenna Reeter went the first 1/3 of an inning. She walked three batters, allowed a single with Karlie Ingersoll and hit second baseman Kora Bain with a pitch, subsequently relieved by freshman Emma Roberts. Roberts pitched until the sixth inning, keeping Trenton in the game, allowing only four hits.
Putnam County starter Claire Tipton was “effectively wild” for most of the game, allowing seven walks to Trenton, but also firing in 14 strikeouts, making it difficult for the Lady Bulldogs offense to put the ball in play.
Trenton cut the early lead to 4-1 in the bottom of the 2nd inning with a gift, as Chloe Harris walked and scored on three straight Tipton wild pitches. After the Lady Midgets pushed the lead back to 5-1 in the 4th inning, on a Samantha Daniels single, scoring Kaylea Webb, Trenton sliced the advantage to 5-2 in the fifth inning, with a Gracyn Rongey double scoring a run. PC found an insurance run in the 7th, with Tipton singling, advancing to second on a wild pitch, and scoring on a single by Grace Schnelle.
The game tightened significantly on Putnam County, up 6-2, in the bottom of the 7th inning, as Tipton’s command difficulties struck, with the Lady Bulldogs loading the bases on a Ivy Foster leadoff single (her second hit of the game), followed by walks to Chandler Lynch and Maci Moore. Putnam County began to trade outs for runs, with a Rongey sacrifice fly making it 6-3, and a Teya Cooksey grounder to the pitcher scoring Lynch to bring the score to 6-4. A walk to Chloe Haris brought Shay Westerhof to the plate as the potential winning run, but she struck out swinging to end the contest.
The Lady Bulldogs offense, while receiving the benefits of runners on the bases with those seven walks, only had four hits, all coming after the fifth inning, with Rongey’s double bolstered a a pair of Ivy Foster singles and a sixth inning lead-off hit by Chloe Harris.
Trenton, coming off a three-game week that included a one-run extra inning win at Albany and a run-rule loss at state-ranked Maysville, will host Princeton on Tuesday afternoon (5:30 PM / KTTN FM 92.3), before traveling to Gallatin on Thursday.
