By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

TUALATIN. Ore.– Karah Miller’s first High School Home Run came at a crucial time in McNary’s 12-3 win over Tualatin Friday afternoon.  The three-run home run capped a fourth inning that saw the Celtics turn a tied 3-3 ball game into a 10-3 advantage as McNary’s bats slowly came to life.  

At that point, it was weird to think that McNary was down 3-1 two innings prior thanks in part to Hudson Douglas’ pitching style before they began to time out the sophomore in the home-away-from-home game.

“We worked a lot on approach yesterday at practice, so I was going up thinking of hitting something in the gap or get the ball in the air.  I went in and looked for my pitch, it was a big moment for me.  First High School Home Run, it felt really good off the bat,” Miller said of the hit. “We really struggled having a good mindset and having a productive at-bat.  We need to work on seeing patterns with pitchers.  I noticed she was throwing a lot of first-pitch strikes, so my plan was to attack her early which was really helpful.”

Miller finished with 4RBI’s in the game with the Celtics adding on two more runs over the last two innings with RBI singles from Lacey Vasas and Miller to close out the game.  Heather Ebner contributed 3RBI’s and Vasas and Natalie Macik each contributed three hits each.  Macik and Vasas held the Timberwolves to four hits and limited the runs to a three-run third inning as they looked to find more consistency with their at-bats.

“We need to keep having consistent, good at-bats.  Our pitching has been great so far, so just having good, productive, consistent at-bats…just getting more at-bats for our players has been really important and I think it’ll help us when we face tough competition and in league play,” said Miller.  

McNary will host Oregon City Monday at 5:15pm before opening Central Valley Conference play Wednesday against North Salem.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald