George Ferguson
Havre Daily News Sports
gferguson@havredailynews.com
Coming into this weekend, the Havre High School girls softball team had just one win on the season. Forty-eight hours later, the Blue Ponies had tripled that total.
Havre opened its weekend with a 5-3 win in Browning on Friday night. On Saturday the Ponies split a pair of games at Sixth Avenue Memorial Field with Glasgow and Poplar.
The Ponies lost to Glasgow 8-4 in the opening game of a four-game triangular that also featured Conrad. Havre defeated Poplar 22-1 in the finale.
The two wins this weekend more than satisfied HHS head coach Bob Evans.
"I saw a lot of good things this weekend and I also saw a lot of things we still need to get better at," Evans said. "But it was a good weekend overall for us and I thought the kids played well."
The only thing that kept the Ponies from going undefeated this weekend was lack of timely hitting. Against Glasgow, Havre jumped out to an early 2-0 lead despite the fact that Scottie pitcher Kelsey Archambeault surrendered just three hits on the day. The Scotties managed to regain the lead, 3-2, by the fourth inning and then appeared to put the Ponies away in the seventh when they tacked on four more runs.
Havre started a rally in the bottom of the seventh and had runners in scoring position that it failed to drive in. That ultimately proved to be the Ponies' undoing.
"We just didn't hit the ball in the late innings," Evans said of the Glasgow game. "We had people on base and we just couldn't get them in. If we could have got a couple of big hits, the game might have turned out differently.
"That is something we need to improve on," he added. "Even against Browning Friday night, we couldn't put them away because we just didn't hit the ball in the late innings."
Archambeault not only starred on the mound for Glasgow, but she also paced the Scotties at the plate. Along with tossing a three-hitter, she went 3-4 with a triple and a pair of singles and two RBIs. The Ponies were led in hitting by Erika Briese, who went 2-2 on the day. Kelsey Evans was 1-4.
Timely hitting was not a problem for Havre in the tournament's final game as the team banged out 13 hits and scored 22 runs against the Poplar Indians. Havre exploded for 11 runs in the third inning and gave pitcher Kelsey Evans more than enough runs to secure the victory. Evans was dominating on the mound, surrendering just one hit to the struggling Indians.
Patterson led the Ponies at the plate with a 2-4 day. Teryl Schrauger also went 2-4 and drove in a pair of runs.
"We hit the ball pretty solidly against Poplar, and we played good defense in both games," Evans said. "It is nice to come away with two wins this weekend, and it is good for our team's confidence because we have some pretty important games coming up this weekend."
The Ponies (3-11) will be back on the road on Friday and Saturday when they travel to Butte for the Butte Central Invitational. Havre will play a pair of games on Friday and two more on Saturday to complete the round-robin tournament.
HAVRE HIGH TRIANGULAR
Glasgow 8, Havre 4
Glasgow 000 211 4 - 8 11 2
Havre 110 020 0 - 4 3 4
WP - Kelsey Archambeault. LP - Kristin Evanson
Havre Batting Leaders - Kelsey Evans 1-4, McKayla Patterson 1-3, Erika Briese 2-2.
Havre 22, Poplar 1 (4.5 innings)
Poplar 100 00 - 1 1 10
Havre 51(11) 5x - 22 13 0
WP - Kelsey Evans. LP - Leslie Buck Elk.
Havre Batting Leaders - Tara Borst 5-5, McKayla Patterson 2-3, Laura Zentmire 2-4.
