Van Buren drops home opener to Conway

With a slew of new and mainly young players, the Van Buren Lady Pointers are undergoing a transition period to start their new softball season. The Lady Pointers were defeated for the second time in as many days, the latest coming in Tuesday’s home opener. Conway led from the first inning on as the Lady Wampus Cats posted a 16-4 win. “We’ve got three freshmen out there right now and they’re doing OK for freshmen; they don’t have a ton of experience,” Van Buren coach Andy Williams said. “Then we put in a freshmen to hit one time, so we played four (Tuesday). ... We’re just a little young in spots. “Technically, we’ve got a new third baseman who played right field last year, we’ve got a new shortstop, we’ve got a new first baseman, we’ve got a new right fielder and a new center fielder. Sometimes, we don’t make throws and on top of that, we haven’t had much practice (due to winter weather conditions), so it’s a double-edged sword right now.” Conway pushed a run across in the top of the first and added three more runs in the second for a 4-0 lead. Van Buren (0-2) did make things interesting in the bottom of the third. The Lady Pointers loaded the bases, and with two out, Brooklyn Fancher cleared them with a double to left, cutting their deficit to a run. But Conway immediately grabbed the momentum right back in the top of the fourth, when Madi Schichtl homered to lead off the inning and the Lady Wampus Cats added another run. Conway then broke the game wide open with five runs in each of the last two innings. Mallory Hopper hit a three-run homer in the sixth and Saige Teague had a two-run shot in the seventh. “They are really good; they’ve got some hitters. ... They hit rockets but then they hit every flare and every line you can hit, too,” Williams said. “And then we made (six) errors, so it was just one of those nights. “We’ve played all right the first two nights. We played a good team (Monday) in Vilonia and we didn’t get back in until 10 last night and then we play (Tuesday) against a good team, so that’s a little bit; those young kids aren’t used to playing like that so there was a little bit of that, too.” Tremere Harris, the lead-off batter for Conway, went 5-for-5, scored three runs and drove in three more. Teague and Hopper had two hits apiece, including their home runs. Van Buren’s lead-off hitter, Katianne Bramlett, went 4-for-4 with a run scored. The Lady Pointers got their last run in the bottom of the seventh, on an RBI fielder’s choice from Cali Jones.

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VAN BUREN DROPS HOME OPENER TO CONWAY

BUCK RINGGOLD

Times Record | 2/27/2019

PHOTO CREDIT: Jamie Mitchell