Elida’s Eva Irons tags out Defiance’s Elizabeth Hoffman during Tuesday’s game at Dorothy Edwards Field. See more high school sports photos at LimaScores.com.
Richard Parrish | The Lima News
Defiance came into its softball game at Elida on Tuesday as the undefeated Western Buckeye League leader and left the same way after a 13-3, six-inning run rule victory.
The Bulldogs (14-3, 6-0 WBL) put the pressure on Elida from the start when they scored four runs in the top of the first inning. Elida dropped to 8-4 overall and 3-2 in the WBL.
Defiance’s offense produced 12 hits, five of them doubles, and Bella Gutierrez, Elizabeth Hoffman, Talya Escamilla and Brooke Gathman all had two hits
Winning pitcher Taighen Zipfel allowed four hits, struck out seven and did not walk a batter.
“We’ve been hitting the ball. In our losses we didn’t hit the ball. But in our wins we’ve had some multi-hit games. We hit the ball well today,” Defiance coach Dennis Parrish said. “And Taighen threw a heck of a game.”
Elida coach Hillary Overholt said, “They hit the ball well. Through the first half of the game we kind of hung with them and then it kind of came to a point where they broke away. Hopefully, we learned from it. Maybe we’ll see them again in the tournament. But they played well today.”
Defiance’s first three hitters in the first inning reached base on an error, an infield single and a walk.
Vida Casarez’s sacrifice fly brought home the first run. Zipfel’s double scored another run and Escamilla’s single made it 3-0 one batter before Lindsay Roth, who doubled to make it 4-0.
Elida cut the deficit in half in the bottom of the first inning when Leah Ramirez reached base on an error with two out and Carly Chiles launched a long home run over the left field fence to make it a 4-2 game.
Elida threatened again in the bottom of the second inning when Abby Daugherty tripled with one out. But Zipfel got the next hitter to pop up to the second baseman, then finished the inning off by getting a groundout.
Zipfel allowed only three Elida hitters to reach base in the final four innings, two of them on hits and the other on an error.
Defiance added three more runs in the top of the fourth inning. Gutierrez had a run-scoring double and Hoffman and Ayvah Cullen singled to score runs in that inning for a 7-2 lead.
Elida got a run in the bottom of the fifth inning on a double by Daugherty and an outfield error to make it 7-3.
The game turned into a run-rule situation in the top of the sixth when Defiance scored six runs on five walks, an error and only one hit, a double by Gathman, which drove in three of the runs.
Reach Jim Naveau at 567-242-0414.
