Amarillo High completes wild comeback, downs Lubbock Cooper
Maybe the Amarillo High softball team had just gotten so used to winning that they didn't expect the start Lubbock-Cooper put up Friday afternoon.
Perhaps it was that old Amarillo-Lubbock rivalry that put some pressure on the Lady Sandies. Whatever it was, Amarillo High found itself down seven runs after the first inning and a half of play, which was not something many players or coaches on the squad anticipated.
Then, something else happened that not many could have seen coming. The Lady Sandies came back to win.
After trailing by seven runs entering the bottom of the second, Amarillo High stormed back to win 11-8 and extended its breathtaking winning streak to 24 games.
That didn't seem like it would be possible after the first inning saw the Lady Sandies (26-1) yield a crooked number.
A litany of errors by the AHS defense compounded to give the Lady Pirates a 6-0 advantage in the top of the first and they added a seventh run in the second. Things were not looking good for Amarillo High.
So, what did head coach Ty Hoobler tell them?
"The conversations was basically, 'Hey, slow start, but it's one half inning and you have six and a half innings left,'" Hoobler said. "I told them not to freak out and just chip away, do their job and get it moving a bit. You can't hit a six-run bomb in that situation so you have to find a way to score runs and you have plenty of time to do that."
That's exactly what AHS did.
In the bottom of the second inning, Amelia Tietz put the Lady Sandies on the board with an RBI double to score Tessia Guzman and get the rally started. Taylyn Shuffield singled to score Tietz and Lindsey Elizondo to chip away at the deficit, trailing 7-3 after two complete.
Amarillo High kept it going in the bottom of the third as Elizondo tripled to pull her squad within two. The next at bat, Danae Lopez slammed a two-run home run to tie the game up at 7-7.
Lubbock-Cooper added a run in the top of the fourth to retake the lead, and kept the Lady Sandies off the board in the bottom half.
Amarillo High wouldn't be denied much longer, though.
Tatem Pendergraft hit a sacrifice fly to score Shuffield in the bottom of the fifth which tied the game once more. The next at bat, Amarillo High officially moved in front an RBI single by Guzman before Tietz tripled to make it 11-8 toward the final tally.
Lansbury and Tietz led the way statistically as both went 3-for-4 on the day with Tietz batting in three runs. Guzman struck out four while allowing five earned runs in four innings in the circle while Pendergraft struck out three while giving up just three hits.
"The positives are that we have a really young team and they battled every inning," Lubbock-Cooper coach Sherri Culwell said. "We had a couple of downs, but I don't think we ever rolled over. They battled, they came out of the box strong and I think this is just a good warm up going into the playoffs."
Non-district softball
Amarillo High 11, Lubbock-Cooper 8
Lubbock-Cooper 610 100 0— 8 11 2
Amarillo High 034 004 0 — 11 12 4
LCP: Tatum Southard, Brooklyn Collins (3 inn.), Brooklyn Ray (5 inn) and Bridget Snodgrass. Tessia Guzman, Tatem Pendergraft (5) and Bryce Budd. W — Pendergraft (4-0). L — Southard (N/A). 2B — LCP, 2 (Snodgrass, Kimber Craig). Amarillo High, 3 (Tietz, Elizondo, Guzman). 3B — LCP, 0. Amarillo High, 2 (Tietz, Elizondo). HR — LCP, 0. Amarillo High, 1 (Lopez).
Records: Lubbock-Cooper 17-13-1, Amarillo High 26-1.
This article originally appeared on Amarillo Globe-News: Amarillo High completes wild comeback, downs Lubbock Cooper
