Daviess County softball will look to hand Ballard its fourth loss of the season when they face off in its semi-state matchup.
The Lady Panthers recently nabbed the Third Region Championship over Hancock County thanks to an offensive explosion in the fourth inning.
The six-run inning was followed up by another big four-run seventh inning leading to a 12-2 win.
Abby and Hattie Newman both registered three hits on the day, also earning a combined six RBIs. Jessie Daniels also supplied plenty of offense with two hits and three RBIs.
The Lady Panthers are coming off back-to-back games of 10-plus runs and Head Coach John Biggs Sr. said that the key to replicating that performance is a calculated approach at the plate.
“We’re going to kind of stick to what we’ve been doing the last few weeks,” Biggs Sr. said. “The key for us is going to be our patience at the plate. I think their pitching is going to want us to chase pitches out of the zone, so we have to lay off those pitches that aren’t strikes and really zero in on pitches that we can handle and we can drive.”
This will be crucial as the Bruins have two dominant pitchers in Brooke Gray and Mak Grimes, who own ERAs of 0.87 and 1.56 respectively. Gray also has a whopping 186 strikeouts on the year.
Ballard is coming off an 8-3 win over Male for the Seventh Region Championship. They also have a potent offense, as there are only three games in which they haven’t scored more than three runs this season.
Biggs Sr. said that the key to halting their offense will be to limit walks and not allow them to cause chaos on the basepaths.
“The key to a lot of that is their aggressiveness on the bases,” Biggs Sr. said. “So we’ve put some emphasis on the last couple days of practice on balls on the outfield that we’ve got to get them into the infield and to the correct bases. Also, our pitcher is going to have to make good pitches.”
Raylee Roby and Greysyne Whitaker have held it down for the Lady Panthers in the circle all season long, both owning ERAs under 2.00 at 1.61 and 1.41 respectively. Roby is coming off her dominant performance against Hancock County in which she struck out 11.
Biggs Sr. is confident that no matter who they go with, they can keep the Bruins on their toes at the plate.
“I think with our pitching, we have a pitching staff [and] I think they complement each other,” Biggs Sr. said. “So depending on who we start, we feel like the one we bring in in relief or if we just want to bring in to change things is going to bring us a different look.”
