By Adam Knoll
Sports correspondent
New Whitewater High School girls softball coach Dan Dowden knows that he has a young group to contend with this season as he looks to change the culture around the program.
“We are young, and we need to grow up quickly this year if we want to contend in our conference.” Explained Dowden, “With only one senior on the squad, our younger players will need to learn to lead by example. It will be a challenging season, but I look forward to some exciting softball in Whitewater this year.”
That air of optimism was stunted a bit with an opening day 16-0 loss to Edgerton. The Whippets had two infield hits during the game, one by mily Kachel and the other from Lauren Lohff. The game was called after 5 innings due to the score.
Get closer in Beloit
One game does not make a season and Whitewater had little time to sulk about their opening day troubles. Micheala Schumacher, who gave up 11 earned runs in the first game, only gave up one earned run in this contest. Trouble was, fielding errors allowed another 5 runs to cross the plate during a 6-1 loss to Beloit-Turner.
“We played much better defense tonight,” Claimed Dowden after the game, “we went “one two three” in the final two innings. Now we have to get the bats going to support the efforts of our pitchers.”
Again, the Whippets were two hit, this time it was CC Minton and Emily Stoll causing the damage. Sage Babcock scored the first Whippet run of the season.
Whippets get the “W”
This past Thursday, the Whippets hosted Clinton and earned their first victory of the season, 7 – 4. Michaela Schumacher went the distance, earning her first win on the season. Schumacher pitched 7 innings while only allowing one earned run. Again, errors cost the team in the form of 3 unearned runs.
Shumacher helped out her own cause with a 2 hit, 2 RBI performance at the plate as well. CC Minton and Lauren Lohff also had two hits in the game.
After it all, it was clear that the first win meant a sigh of relief for the new coach.
“It is nice to get that first one,” said Dowden. “We face a tough week ahead, playing McFarland twice. We need to continue to clean up the defense and to start putting some dents in our bats.”
