TOPEKA — Iola High’s Fillies found a groove Tuesday afternoon, head coach Chris Weide noted.
“But it was the wrong groove,” he lamented. “We just couldn’t get out of it.”
Iola’s softball season came to a painful end as Independence scored 10 runs over the sixth and seventh innings in a 14-6 victory of their Class 4A Regional Semifinal.
“It boils down to they made plays and we didn’t,” Weide said.
Nowhere was that as evident in the final two innings.
The decisive rally was fueled by a steady diet of Bulldog bunts that, for one reason or another, Iola struggled to defend.
In fact, bunting was a topic of discussion this week as the Fillies practiced, Weide said.
Problem was, the discussions centered on Iola’s bunting strategies — particularly how the Fillies could use them if necessary to extend rallies — but not so much if the tables were turned.
“That’s on me,” Weide said. “They started bunting, and just ran with it.”
The score was knotted at 4-4 to start the sixth inning.
Indy hit a leadoff double, followed by Bulldog right fielder Richelle Reichenberger’s bunt, which forced an Iola throwing error, and brought in the tie-breaking run. Reichenberger circled the bases and got to third by the time the ball was back in the infield.
That worked so well that the next batter, Mercy Smith, laid down an identical bunt, which led to another Fillies error and scoring another run for the Bulldogs.
You can probably predict what happened next.
A third straight bunt, to the exact same location as the first two, was counted as a single when the Fillies opted not to attempt another risky throw to first.
And so the trend continued. A fourth straight bunt turned into a sacrifice for an out, but a throw back home to try to stop a Bulldog runner from scoring was off the mark for another error, pushing the lead to 8-4.
The misery continued with a dropped third strike allowing the next batter to reach base. A walk followed to the next hitter, and then a line drive single by Indy’s Riley Marquez plated two for a 10-4 lead.
