By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

ALBANY, Ore.-  Dallas softball had to find, and did eventually found, a way to get it done to complete the regular season sweep of West Albany.  Defeating the Bulldogs 5-3 in the process Monday evening, their ninth-straight win.

Monday’s Mid-Willamette Conference contest saw the Dragons jump out to a 5-0 lead going into the bottom half of the second inning.  Emma Moore, Chole Zajac and Kaelyn Golden all had RBI hits with two more runs coming in off of errors in the frame.

“It definitely pumped us up for the rest of the game.  It started it up and it felt good getting the lead and having that cushion,” Zajac said. “I don’t normally get too nervous, but I was a little nervous towards the sixth because they got three runs in.  But it wasn’t too bad.”

Their defense held strong.  Kadence Morrison pounded the zone, picking up nine strikeouts in the complete game effort with her defense making the stops, but West Albany dug deep and got after it in the bottom half of the sixth inning. 

Two singles and an error allowed the Bulldogs to get on the board.  Kylie Carapinha plated two with an RBI double that made it 5-3.  The Dallas defense settled down to close out the sixth with back-to-back strikeouts to end the threat.

West Albany’s defense held just as strong as the Dragon defense did with their fifth-straight zero to close out the game but couldn’t do further damage on Morrison and her defense in the final frame of the game.

“I felt like it could’ve gone better, I felt like we fell asleep, and we didn’t stay alive with the bats.  If we were consistent with the bats, we struggled in the first inning and then we came alive there in the second inning before it just fell off,” Jordan Creswell said. “On Lebanon on Friday, our bats were alive the whole entire time and were consistent throughout all of it.

“But it was good for us.  We hadn’t had a test like that since preseason, so it was kind of a reminder that we need to stay alive throughout the rest of league.”

Dallas host Silverton on Wednesday at 4:30pm. 

Carapinha led the Bulldog offense with 2RBI’s while Serena Hattori led the offense by going 2-for-3 hitting.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald