Wins continue to pile up for Greene County softball team

By MARK SCHAFER mschafer@iowainformation.com

They haven’t all been easy, but all of them have ended with the same result. 

Recently the Greene County softball team has been on a hot streak as they have won their last three games that they’ve played in. 

The most impressive win came in the contest on Monday night when they beat South Hamilton 10-0 in a five-inning game. 

Over the course of the last week the Rams have also defeated Saydel 5-1. Tuesday night against Roland-Story the Rams were able to gain a 10-6 victory. 

What propelled the Rams to a victory on Monday night was their good hitting against South Hamilton. 

Coach Tom Kennedy was happy with how well the entire lineup seemed to bat. 

“We had a lot of good at-bats from everyone, we were able to play some small ball, we had some big hits as well,” Kennedy said. “I’m just really proud of everyone, we had a really  well-rounded game like we needed to. We also just had a good executed game overall offensively.”

The hits started almost immediately. The first two batters were able to get on base with a single. The second hit of the contest allowed Greene County to score and take an early lead. 

Later in the first inning the Rams scored one more run off of a single. 

The big hits continued in the bottom of the second inning. Olivia Shannon was able to hit the ball to the left field fence for a triple allowing the Rams to score another run. Later, on a play at first, the South Hamilton defense was too preoccupied with the ball that they couldn’t make the play at home, and the Rams were able to gain their fourth run of the game. 

Big hits continued to greet the Rams in the bottom of the second as Emma Hoyle sent a line-drive shot over the center field fence for her fourth home run of the season. 

Following Hoyle’s solo home run the Rams had a 5-0 lead. 

In the fourth inning the Rams would strike again as the Rams would load the bases, twice, with one run scoring off a bases-loaded single. 

Towards the end of the inning eighth grader, Sara Morlan was able to hit a bases-clearing double that scored three runs. 

With that the Rams were able to take a 10-0 lead, and just needed their defense to hold off South Hamilton.

“We’ve been doing really good defensively lately,” Kennedy said. “We played really well defense, and are getting better each game. We still have some lineup changes that we are playing around with, but overall we’ve had good play defensively. 

“It is just really hard for our defense to get into a rhythm sometimes because they don’t get a lot of action.They are getting better at staying on their toes and staying ready to play the ball.”

South Hamilton did challenge Greene County in the top of the fifth as a lead-off single put a base runner on. 

From there the Ram defense went to work as a pop fly was caught by third baseman Payton Kokenge. Then, right fielder Chanlyn Cunningham secured a pop fly of her own for the second out. 

The game ended just a few pitches later when Becca Anderson stopped a ball at her short stop position and fired it over to Paige Teeples for the final out of the game. 

Overall the Rams finished with eight hits. 

Shannon and Alexa Peters both had two hits in the game. Another two hits were turned in by Kokenge. 

Emma Hoyle’s home run was her only hit. Emma Stream had a single in the game. Temples and Cunningham both turned in singles as well. 

Peters and Kokenge both had two RBI. Shannon, Hoyle and Stream each had one RBI. 

Hoyle pitched five innings and allowed just four hits. She hit one batter and struck out four. 

The closest game for the Rams within the last week came against Saydel. The Rams rallied for three runs in the fifth inning to take a 5-1 lead over the Eagles. 

Both teams scored once in the first inning. After Greene County scored three runs in the fifth, they added one more in the seventh for good measure. 

The win by the Rams was the first defeat that Saydel had tasted this year. 

Greene County had seven hits in the game. 

Shannon and Hoyle both had two hits each. Shannon had two singles. Hoyle had a single and a double. 

Alexa Peters had a single and a RBI. Emma Stream had a double and two RBI. 

Kokenge finished with a single. Teeples and Cunningham both had a single as well. 

Shannon scored two runs, Peters, Cunningham and Addison Gannon all scored one run each. 

Inside the circle Hoyle pitched all seven innings. She allowed three hits and one earned run. She walked two batters and struck out seven. 

Tuesday night the Rams beat Roland-Story 10-6, for Greene County’s 10th win of the year. No stats from that contest were available at press time. 

In the next week the Rams will take on St. Edmond, Denison-Schleswig and Glenwood on the road. They also host West Marshall and Manson-NW Webster.