SPORTS
Lady Rabbits give Henrietta a challenge
The Bowie Lady Rabbits lost a tough game at Henrietta on Tuesday night as they started the second round of district play.
The Lady Cats won 11-6 against as the Lady Rabbits were playing catch up after a tough first inning.
Bowie was coming off a win against City View and some extra practice time. The Lady Rabbits had gone 2-4 in the first round of district, though they had been dealing with some key injuries when it started.
The first game against Henrietta several weeks back had been brutal. Bowie had lost 13-0 after five innings due to run-rule and had failed to get any hits or baserunners on during the game.
Despite play being better recently, it looked like it would be a similar result after the first inning.
Besides the Lady Rabbits getting a base hit, there were little positives for Bowie.
The Lady Cats had six singles, drew one walk and a fielding error in the outfield allowed Henrietta to score seven runs in the first inning to go up 7-0.
The Lady Cats added to it in the third inning, with three singles and a double scoring three more runs to go up 10-0.
Heading into the fifth inning, Bowie needed to score at least one run or the game would end early due to run-rule again. Instead, the Lady Rabbits came back.
Unlike the first game, Bowie’s offense had some success up to that point, even loading the bases up in the second inning, but could not get any one home.
The Lady Rabbits found some success as they loaded the bases up with no outs. Serenity Klump then drew a walk to score the one run Bowie needed to keep the game going, but the team wanted more.
KP Rutherford hit a single to left field that drove in two runs. Two batters later, Sadie Britt then hit a groundball to the shortstop that induced an error that allowed another run to come in and score.
Bowie had cut the lead down to 10-4.
The Lady Cats got one of the runs back in the same inning with an RBI double to go up 11-4.
The score was the same heading into the final inning for the Lady Rabbits.
With two runners on base and no outs, Rutherford came through again with a single that drove in one run.
Sage Gossett then followed and grounded out to the second basemen, but it drove in another run for Bowie.
Unfortunately, the offensive magic could not keep going. Following a single, the next two batters were retired to end the game.
Henrietta won 11-6.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.
Two former Bowie boy’s golf members played in the PGA University Championship on Nov. 12-13. (L-R) Cy Egenbacher and Imanol Walker are both in the Sam Houston University PGA Golf Managerment program. The team finished 16th overall. Egenbacher shot 168 during the two rounds and finished tied for 67th. Walker shot 180 and finished 84th. The tournament is a fun one for univesities that have PGA Golf Management programs, which is for individuals who want to work in the golf industry after graduation.
The Saint Jo Lady Panthers came up short at the regional final for the third straight season, one game away from state, on Saturday at the regional tournament in Midlothian.
The Lady Panthers beat Evant in straight sets 3-0 on Friday to reach the final game against Harrold which they lost 3-0.
Saint Jo knew before the season even started it would likely come to this big challenge, but it still had to go through all the steps to get there.
The Panthers reached the regional finals the previous two seasons, losing both times to eventual state champion Blum.
With district realignment meant a new region so a rematch with a Blum program that had graduated several key players from those teams would have to wait until state possibly.
Instead, a showdown against last year’s state runner-up Harrold was forecast in the regional final.
With the team having six seniors, with five of them having been on varsity since they were freshman, it was this year or bust for Saint Jo.
First, the Lady Panthers had to beat Evant. The Lady Elks leaned heavily on a big front court player. When she rotated to the back row, Evant showed almost no net resistance which meant Saint Jo hitters had free reign during that time.
The Lady Panthers won each set pretty easily, with the scores being 25-17, 25-17 and 25-19.
This set up the match with Harrold the team had been anticipating. The Lady Hornets had been at or near the top of the state standings since the beginning of the season.
Harrold had so much respect it had even played bigger local schools this season, beating Bowie in straight sets and Nocona in five sets during its pre-district schedule.
The two teams had met earlier in the season when the Lady Hornets attended Saint Jo’s hosted tournament. The two teams met in the tournament championship where Harrold won 2-1.
Still, with the tournament format being a best of three instead of five and the match after playing an exhausting schedule of five matches the previous two days, that result was not gospel, especially two months later.
The challenge is Harrold had multiple big hitters at the net, which is a big deal since most 1A teams are lucky to have one or two, which meant constant pressure on Saint Jo’s defense.
This also meant the Lady Panthers constantly had to find ways to attack the Lady Hornet defense as well or it would face strong hit after strong hit which was unsustainable for any team.
The first set saw the Lady Hornets get out to a good start before the Lady Panthers rallied back and took a little lead 8-7. Unfortunately, it started turn from there.
Harrold had some good runs from the service line that Saint Jo struggled to make much offense out of and led to the Lady Hornets pulling away. Harrold won 4-1 to get the lead to 11-9 and then extended it to 14-11, 17-13. Another 4-1 run and the Lady Hornets could smell the end of the first set coming.
The Lady Hornets won 25-17 to take the lead 1-0.
Saint Jo needed to bounce back, but unfortunately never got anything going in set two.
Harrold led 4-1 and then 8-2. The Lady Panthers would have needed a huge run at some point from the service line to get back into the set, but it never came as the Lady Hornets lead grew more and more.
Harrold took set two 25-13 to go up 2-0 and had all of the momentum.
Saint Jo had its back against the wall, knowing the only option was to hope for a comeback that would lead to a fifth set, but to get there it needed to win set three.
The Lady Panthers initially started on the right foot. After falling being 4-1 to start the previous two sets, it was Saint Jo that started well up 4-1. Unfortunately, the Lady Hornets came roaring back, going on an 8-2 run as it led 9-6, then 12-8 and 15-10.
It looked like it was heading towards a similar place as set one with Harrold slowly running away with the set before the Lady Panthers made one last gasp.
Saint Jo eventually cut the lead down to one point, trailing 20-19 as the set entered the final stretch and the Lady Panthers had their best momentum of the match.
Unfortunately, it was Harrold that was able to close the set out with momentum, earning the final five points to win 25-19 and the match 3-0.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News. For pictures from Friday’s match, click here https://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?l=bnews1&AID=6870620&T=1
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