By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

SILVERTON, Ore.–  Central had found themselves in a game trailing Silverton 1-0 going into the fourth inning Tuesday.  The Panthers Lily McCormick’s rise ball created problems for the Foxes during the opening three innings as the sophomore picked up all four of her strikeouts over those innings, not to mention the Central defense turning a double-play at first by Maeci Brown.

“We did pretty good, we kept the runs down low and we were able to work together and were able to communicate on the field,” McCormick said.  “I thought it was pretty good because we start off pretty well and I think we can learn from how to stay strong through the end will help us through future games.”

That fourth inning was stuff of nightmares for the Panthers and an inning where everything clicked for Silverton.  Serving as a good learning experience of how to stay strong points McCormick and starting, adjusting sooner points the Foxes’ McKenzee Petersen as Silverton scored 15-runs in the bottom half of the fourth inning.  Pulling away for a 16-0 win in Mid-Willamette Conference play and for the Foxes eighth-straight win in the process.

Coming off their ninth-inning victory over Lebanon, it was a good sign to see them carry that momentum from that 6-5 victory into Tuesday’s game with Central.

“I think we just carried that on from that game to this game and we did good,” Petersen said of Friday’s win going into Tuesday’s game.  “We started off really slow, (McCormick) had a really good rise-ball that we really couldn’t lay-off off.  Then we just started to build off of each other in the fourth and just rallied.  It was electric, it was crazy.  We just had a lot of energy and we just kept going,  We’ve been sticking together.”

Petersen and Kate Kofstad each led the Foxes with two hits each.  Hannah Houts and Kofstad each had game-high 3RBI’s for the home squad.  Sophia Beasly led the Panthers with two hits. Brown and Kayden Pairan each had a hit apiece for Central.  The Panthers head to West Albany Wednesday, Silverton hosts South Albany on Wednesday.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald