Garden City's late rally short circuits in loss to Lamar

By Mike Pilosof

Photo by Adam Shrimplin

Lamar, CO-This time, Garden City's late-game rally short circuited in the seventh.  

Katelynne Russell fell a triple shy of hitting for the cycle, knocking in three runs, as Lamar beat the Broncbusters 5-3 at Citizens Field Saturday afternoon.

After a scoreless first, the Lopes got to Madison biller in the second. Mireya Arranda singled, and Morgan Reed brought her around with a base hit to center to put Lamar up 1-0.

It stayed that way until the fifth. That's when Biller surrendered a leadoff walk to Alicia Fraire. Two batters later, Russell clubbed a two-run homer to make it 3-0.

The Broncbusters finally broke through in the sixth. Audrey Graf, Madison Biller and Carly Powell hit three straight singles to load the bases with one out. After Graf was thrown out at home on a force play, Kenzie Moore got Garden City on the board with a sharp single to left. But with the tying run on, Ellie Walters lined out to second.

Lamar then added some insurance in the home half. Viviana Guzman and Russell stroked RBI singles, and the Lopes were up 5-1.

Garden City made things interesting in the seventh. McKayla Encinias walked, which was followed by back-to-back Lamar errors, one of which resulted in a run that closed the gap to three runs. Two batters later, Powley provided a fielder's choice RBI to make it 5-3. But again, with the tying run on, Gaby Hernandez popped out to third to end the game.

Sloane Vigoren picked up the win fo9r Lamar, allowing one earned run on seven hits in 6 1/3.

Biller lost for the second time, yielding four runs on seven hits in 5 2/3. Graf finished 3-for-4 at the plate.