Softball Preview: Yuba City Honkers vs. Bella Vista Broncos
The Yuba City Honkers will head out on the road to face off against the Bella Vista Broncos at 4:00 p.m. on Thursday. Yuba City is strutting in with some hitting muscle as they've averaged 9 runs per game this season.
Last Monday, Yuba City came up short against Wheatland and fell 7-3. Yuba City has not had much luck with Wheatland recently, as the team's come up short the last two times they've met.
Naiema Cawthon was cooking despite her team's loss, going 1-for-3 with a home run.
Meanwhile, Bella Vista had already won five in a row (a stretch where they outscored their opponents by an average of 10 runs), and they went ahead and made it six on Tuesday. They came out on top against the Titans by a score of 10-7.
Hailey Shiflet made a splash while hitting and pitching. She didn't allow a single earned run over 4.2 innings pitched. Shiflet was also big at the plate, scoring a run while going 3-for-4.
In other batting news, the team relied heavily on Rosie Harrod, who scored three runs and stole a base while going 2-for-4. She has been hot recently, having posted at least one stolen base the last three times she's played. Another player making a difference was Arielle Hering, who went 1-for-3 with two RBI and a double.
Yuba City's defeat dropped their record down to 15-8. As for Bella Vista, they are on a roll lately: they've won eight of their last nine contests, which provided a nice bump to their 16-3 record this season.
Fans could be in store for some top-tier slugging on Thursday. Yuba City hasn't had any problems when it comes to power this season, having averaged 0.7 home runs per game. However, it's not like Bella Vista struggles in that department as they've been averaging 0.4. With so much power on both teams, it'll be down to the pitchers to keep the mound locked down.
Yuba City came up short against Bella Vista in their previous matchup back in April, falling 12-7. A big factor in that loss was the dominant performance of Bella Vista's Alyssa Dethlefson, who struck out 13 batters over seven innings while giving up three earned (and four unearned) runs off 12 hits (and only one walk). Now that Yuba City knows the damage she can cause, will they be able to stop her this time? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
Article generated by infoSentience based on data entered on MaxPreps
