Carson softball eliminated from playoffs

Carson High's stay in the 4A Region al softball tournament was shorter than anyone wanted.

The Senators, without a senior on the team, lost two straight games and were eliminated Thursday. Carson lost 7-3 to Reed and 5-1 to Wooster, concluding its season with a 17-13 record.

"I told the girls I was disappointed that we were out," Carson coach Scott Vickrey said. "I'm extremely proud of how much we've grown since Day 1. You look at this team of 14, and over half played their first varsity games this season."

Vickrey said Carson's best days of softball are ahead of it, especially when you consider the team's main pitchers, Cassie Vondrak and Nikki Keller, are both freshmen. Christa Casci, who also pitches, is only a sophomore.

This was a day where the Senators' inexperience showed. Carson made seven errors and didn't convert on the few scoring opportunities it had.

In the opener against Reed, Carson manufactured a first-inning run against Kelsey Hawley, but didn't score again until the bottom of the seventh. By that time, Reed had built up a 7-1 lead.

Vondrak sailed through the first two innings, but gave up three runs in the third inning.

Megan Rohan singled and moved to second on Cassie Pasley's chopper over second base. Erica McKenzie moved both runners over with a sacrifice bunt. Cassie Hunt followed with a single to left, and Sarah Evans let the ball go under her glove and all the way to the wall in left. Two runs scored and Hunt ended up at third.

"She pulled her head in anticipation of coming up and making a throw," Vickrey said.

Hunt held at third on Ali Berry's infield single, but scored when Jessica Leonard misplayed Krystal Craig's squibber.

Vondrak left in the fourth after giving up singles to Tia Wunder and Rohan. Keller came on and yielded a single to Pasley. Wunder had stopped at third, but she ended up scoring to make it 4-1 when Kaitlin Burroughs threw wildly toward home. Keller retired the side without further damage.

Craig and Rachel Jepsen hit back-to-back homers off Keller in the fifth, stretching the lead to 6-1.

That was more than Hawley actually needed. The Reed ace did surrender two unearned runs in the seventh. She finished with four strikeouts and two walks.

"She threw real well and we made good defensive plays (until the seventh) behind her," Reed coach Ray Charles said. "She kept the ball down and got a lot of groundballs."

Hawley kept working the outside part of the plate, and it didn't seem that the Carson hitters adjusted very much.

"I asked the hitters to be aggressive,; go after the first pitch if it was there," Vickrey said. "Some did and others didn't do so well. That's a young team."

Dacey Hassey singled and doubled and drove in Carson's first run in the opening inning.

The Senators opened their loser's bracket game against Wooster with a first-inning run thanks to a single by Abby Rankl and a two-out throwing error by Renee Glenn.

Wooster scored two unearned runs off Vondrak in the second, as the normally reliable Casci made three fielding errors.

The game settled into a pitcher's duel at that point between Vondrak and Wooster's Karen Henjum. Vondrak retired 10 of 13 hitters spanning the second through the fifth innings. Henjum wiggled out of a first-and-second situation in the fourth by retiring Casci.

Vondrak left after the fifth, suffering from heat exhaustion, according to Vickrey.

"Cassie threw very well," Vickrey said. "She told me she was feeling faint. That's why we made the change."

Carson missed a golden opportunity to tie or go ahead in the sixth, an inning that saw the game protested by Carson and stopped for at least 10 minutes.

Candice Rutledge reached on an error by Glenn and moved around to third on Katie McEwan's pinch-hit double.

Loretta Cagle tried to squeeze home Rutledge, but the ball went right back to Henjum, who flipped the ball to Valerie Fritz, easily retiring Rutledge, who didn't even bother to slide.

"Cagle showed it too soon," Vickrey said. "As soon as the ball is down, the runner on third breaks. She bunted the ball right back at the pitcher and Candice got hung out to dry."

Desi Clampett popped to first for the second out. That's when the fun started. After the second pitch to Evans, Fritz tried to pick off McEwan at third. Her throw knocked the bat out of Evans' hands. The plate umpire called Evans out for interference. Vickrey argued briefly and then protested the game.

That brought umpire-in-chief and softball commissioner George Ritter out of the stands. Ritter read the rule book first and then the case book. It was in the second manual that he found the ruling. Since Evans hadn't done anything intentional, the out was waved off. On the next pitch, Evans grounded out to second.

Wooster exploded for three runs in the seventh, as Glenn redeemed herself with a three-run homer well over the fence in left-center field to make it 5-1, essentially ending any hopes of a Carson comeback.

"We had some opportunities that we just didn't convert," Vickrey said. 'We hit the ball hard at times, but we did kick it around a little and that hurt."

MCQUEEN 10, DOUGLAS 0

The Lancers' Katie Eshelman no-hit the Tigers in the first round, striking out 10 and allowing just one baserunner the entire game.

Eshelman also helped herself at the plate with two hits, three runs scored and an RBI. Heather Bochenski went 3-for-3 and drove in four runs.

SPANISH SPRINGS 9, WOOSTER 2

Mallory Darby pitched a one-hitter over five innings, as the top-seeded Cougars breezed to an easy victory.

Darby allowed a first-inning single to Danielle Ming and then set the Colts down without a hit before leaving after five innings with the game well in hand.

Jen Martensen and Rebecca Davidson blasted two-run homers in a four-run fifth inning.

RENO 5, MANOGUE 1

Stepahnie Shuman scattered seven hits and doubled in a run to lead the Huskies to an easy win.

Britton Murdock led an 11-hit attack with a two-run homer and single. Shuman and Amanda Nims also had two hits. Samantha Puzey contributed an RBI double.

DOUGLAS 7, MANOGUE 3

Mitzi Olsen scattered seven hits and Lauren Hoppe slugged a two-run homer in the first to help the Tigers stave off elimination and send the Miners packing.

With the score tied at 3, the Tigers scored two in the fourth and two in the sixth. Tish Luken contributed a run-scoring double. Corby Ramsey doubled home two runs in the third for the Miners, tying the game at 3.

•Contact Darrell Moodya t dmoody@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1281