The Sobrato softball team ended its season on a low note Friday,
dropping its last home game 11-3 to Oak Grove.
By Tatiana Getty Special to the Times
The Sobrato softball team ended its season on a low note Friday, dropping its last home game 11-3 to Oak Grove.
After winning their first two league games, the Bulldogs close the season with a record of 2-12 in the Blossom Valley Athletic League Santa Teresa Division and 7-17 overall.
Still, coach Rob Piper said he’s proud of the team, and despite the loss, the girls showed determination and perseverance.
“We played to the best of our ability from the first inning through the seventh,” Piper said. “The score didn’t reflect how hard the girls played. I was really appreciative of the girls, they played as hard as they could and remained focused throughout the game.”
Piper also said the team – coming off two winless seasons in the Tri-County Athletic League — has greatly improved for its first season in the BVAL, and third season in existence.
“At the beginning of the season we thought it would be great if we could win one or two games,” Piper said. “We won our first two league games, and they had never won a game in the history of the school. The girls did really well.”
The Bulldogs are a young team, and that’s obvious in their skill level. The team is made up mostly of underclassmen, and only a handful of girls have prior experience playing softball in an organized league.
“We had a very inexperienced team,” Piper said. “We had only two or three girls that actually play summer (ball), some pitchers that hadn’t pitched in high school (before) and a couple of freshman that ended up being a whole side of my infield, so there’s not a lot of softball experience.”
Because of this, Piper said he stresses the basics of the game. The team focuses on breaking the game down to its fundamentals, cutting errors and taking advantage of its consistent offense to get runners on, and hopefully score some runs.
“What I tell the girls is one error will equal one run, and one run will cost you one game,” Piper said. “So what we’d like to do next year is focus on defense. We seem to hit the ball pretty well.”
What the team lacks in experience, they make up in effort and perseverance. Because of this, Piper is looking forward to next season.
“I was very proud of the effort, attitude and enthusiasm the girls put into the season,” Piper said. “They held their heads up high. Not one time this season did we walk away thinking that if we played that team again, we couldn’t beat them.”
