By Vern Hee

The Lady Trojans went on a long road trip last week and played some of the top softball teams in the state.

They played Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Monday.

On Wednesday, they played Arbor View, who is one of the top ten teams in the state, and lost 10-2.

On Thursday, they went to Bishop Gorman to play in a fierce tournament with more top teams from California and Nevada.

The first team they played on Thursday, was a tough Washington Union team from California. They lost 3-1, and then they played Bishop Gorman right after and lost to them 13-1.

The only consolation for the Trojans at the Bishop game was Dayton Ying Ling, All-conference team pitcher for Gorman, did not throw a no-hitter like last year against them.

On Friday, they continued and played Kofa, Arizona and beat them 4-3 and then played Foothill, another top Nevada team, and lost to them, 12-1.

Monday, they finished the road trip at Foothill again, and lost 9-4. So in all, the team played six games in four days with one win.

Elias Armendariz, head Trojans softball coach, is not frustrated. This is all part of his strategy to make the team better, by playing teams at a higher level. He believes if the team is to do well in the IA division, they need to see better pitching and play better teams.

“The team is facing some tough teams. I want them to learn from their mistakes,” said Armendariz.

He said the team is learning and is not frustrated at the losses. He feels they know they are getting better and are close to beating some tough opponents.

“We have been getting two outs pretty quickly in the last games, but have been making fundamental errors like balls going through legs. We just have had a hard time making the third out and that is when the other teams have been scoring the runs,” said Armendariz.

He has made a few changes to his lineup. At the end of the first tournament, he moved MacRae out of catcher and made her back-up to Bryana Soliwada, who was playing third base. He moved a freshman, Katelyn Button to third base.

The six games have given Armendariz a chance to rest Whitney Roderick, starting Trojans pitcher and to see freshman, Lauren Konig pitch, along with Amanda Pryor.

He said Roderick has been doing a good job, but she has pitched so much, that she developed a blister on her pitching hand.

In the Bishop Gorman tournament, the highlight was Sarah Zinnecker hitting a home run over the fence.

The Trojans have a week off to recuperate and get ready for the last big tournament before league play, which is at Centennial High School. This is a three-day tournament, which starts on Thursday of next week.

League play starts at Cheyenne High School on April 2 and then the first home game is against Clark on April 4.