Trojans overcome errors to defeat Cheyenne

The Trojans beat Cheyenne 23-11 with the help of a grand slam from senior Jill Smith in the top of the sixth inning.

This was her first grand slam, but she had a couple of home runs when she was a freshman.

“I am not sure if there was one out or two, but the pitch was knee-high,” she said. “The whole thing was surreal because I didn’t know the ball had gone out and when I got past first base I heard Coach Lauver yelling, ‘Get out, get out’ and when he yells that it means the ball went out of the park.”

Smith also hit a double earlier in the game that went all the way to the fence.

For the Trojans (18-7 overall, 7-0 Sunset League) Cheyenne (7-6, 4-3) looked like another easy win, but something went wrong early on in the game.

The young Lady Trojans team committed 10 errors and was losing 10-7 in the top of the sixth.

Trojans coach Eli Armendariz had to face losing his first league game.

“I was thinking that a loss might be actually good for this team, but then I had second thoughts because that would mean we would be the second-seed team,” Armendariz said.

Those thoughts all went away when he put some pinch hitters in to bat. Freshmen Hailee Danneker and McKayla Bartley got things going with some strong hitting.

“We had a situation at the top of the sixth where bases were loaded,” the coach said. “My regulars were getting on base and I knew Danneker hit the ball with power and I knew I could count on a line drive. Dannecker and Bartley got things going and then Jill Smith came up and hit a grand slam.”

The Trojans made up for the 10 errors and scored 12 runs for the win.

The coach wasn’t blaming his team for the errors.

“The field was in poor condition,” he said. “There was a layer of dust that when the ball hit the dust it would stop. There was no expected bounce.”

Other notable hitters during the Cheyenne game were Jordan Egan, who had two hits, two doubles and two RBIs, Amaya Mendoza had four hits, two doubles and three RBIs, and Evandy Murphy had three hits and an RBI.

The spring break wasn’t much of a break for Pahrump Valley. While Clark County was on break, they played in a softball tournament on April 13 and went 1-4.

“We played some great teams and the goal there was to get better in the areas we need to fix,” Armendariz said. “The tournament allowed us to look at our weak areas like fielding and hitting good pitching.”

Then during their break, Clark County schools came off break, and this meant while on break the Trojans played two league games against Sunrise Mountain and Mojave, beating the Miners 16-1 and the Rattlers 23-4. They then played Durango in non-league play on April 21 and lost 9-4.

On April 24 they resumed league play, beating Desert Pines 24-2 and then went to Cheyenne on Wednesday for their second league game of the week and had some problems.

The Trojans remain in first place and will host Western at 3:30 p.m. today.

Contact sports editor Vern Hee at vhee@pvtimes.com