Yerington scores in eighth to beat Dust Devils

DAYTON - Yerington pushed across an unearned run in the top of the eighth to knock off Dayton 4-3, spoiling the Dust Devils' last home softball game of the season.

The loss was the third in the last five Northern 3A games, which has coach Daven Passalacqua concerned.

"We've been so much better," Passalacqua said. "We're not rising up. At this time of the year you have to rise up. We didn't execute today; no execution. We had some opportunities."

Dayton took a 1-0 lead in its first at-bat when Mariah Collins reached on an error and scored on a single by Mackenzie Cole, who was tagged with the loss in relief.

The Dust Devils added runs in the third when Taylor Hayes doubled and scored on a single by Lindsie Cross.

Cross was superb in the circle through the first four innings, allowing just four baserunners. She ran into trouble in the fifth, however.

After retiring the first two batters, Cross walked Brooke Aiazzi. Madeline Hull-Taylor singled Aiazzi to third. Taylor advanced to second on the throw to try to get Aiazzi out. Haley Richardson followed with a triple to right to tie the game at 2. Richardson made it 3-2 when she scored on a Cross wild pitch.

"I thought Lindsie did a pretty good job," Passalacqua said. "I was bringing Mackenzie in to close it, but we had a couple of mistakes defensively."

Dayton tied the game in the sixth when Natasha Wells reached on an error and scored on Cole's game-tying double. Cole, however, rounded the bag too far and was thrown out for the first out of the inning. Cheyanna Burrows hit a one-hopper to right field, but was thrown out at first. Denae Detweiler reached on an error, but Katie Nicholas struck out Kylie Shepherd to end the threat.

Neither team threatened in the seventh, setting the stage for Yerington's eighth-inning rally.

Richardson singled to open the eighth and moved to second on a passed ball. After Cole fanned Trinity Thom. Richardson scored on an error by the Dayton second baseman enabling the Lions to score what proved to be the winning run.

The teams conclude the regular season Friday with a doubleheader. Games are slated to start at 3 and 5 p.m.