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Cottey Comets sweep North Arkansas College at home
"Megan did real well." That statement from Cottey College Comets head softball coach Greg Tietz was a somewhat misleading description of start Megan Steffens' performance as the Cottey College Comets finally got their chance to host the Pioneers of North Arkansas College Tuesday.
Aside from one rough inning early in the contest, Steffens kept the Pioneers off-balance all day long and gave a lights-out performance through the game's five-inning duration. Steffens finished the day allowing just two runs on two hits five strikeouts and two walks.
The Comets, however, had no trouble generating offense against North Arkansas' struggling pitching and defense. The Comets started fast and never slowed down in the contest, ultimately taking a 10-2 victory by run rule in five innings.
"It was good to see them come along, Tietz said. "We tried to lay down some more bunts, do the short game, work that a little bit more."
The Comets did just that as they were the beneficiaries of three hits that never left the infield, as well as a couple of costly errors by the North Arkansas defense. The most notable of those was a swinging bunt in the fifth inning by Cottey's Ciara Brown back toward the pitcher that was ultimately thrown away twice on the play, allowing Brown to circle the bases without even getting a hit.
Head coach Seychelle Mahoney's Pioneers drew first blood in the contest as Steffens made her only two mistakes of the day, ultimately resulting in back-to-back hits, one of which was the only home run of the game. That gave the Pioneers a quick 2-0 lead, but the Comets wasted little time getting both of those runs back in the home half of the frame as Lauren Akin knocked in Ashley Wilson with an RBI infield hit and eventually came around to score when she stole home plate on an attempted pickoff throw to second.
The Comets took the lead for the first and last time when an illegal pitch was called, allowing Leesa Schaumann a free pass across the plate. The Comets later went on to add three more runs in the third inning and four in the fifth to put the game away by the run rule.
Steffens held the Pioneers hitless for the remainder of the game, only allowing two more baserunners. Steffens never even went to a three-ball count against any North Arkansas hitter until the fourth inning when she gave up her only walk of the day.
"She just has it going on, she's been feeling really good lately," Tietz said of his sophomore pitcher. "So it was nice to see her come through."
Despite their strong showing, the Comets were forced to play through some adversity as neither sophomore outfielder Brianna Blacklock or sophomore infielder Amanda Sebree were available to play. Those losses didn't seem to bother the Comets as their defense played a nearly flawless game, keeping the Pioneers' offense off the board.
"We're missing two of our best players out today with injuries and gave the opportunity to a few others to step up and they came forward today," Tietz said. "We've been really working at it. I just wanted to be much cleaner and handle the ball a lot better like we're capable of and like I've seen them do in practice a million times."
The Comets kept the pressure on through the day's second game, earning another strong victory. However, the final score was unavailable at press time.
With those victories, the Comets improved their overall record to 4-8 on the spring season and were scheduled to be in action again today, hosting the Red Devils of Allen County Community College at 3 and 5 p.m.
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