Lady Tigers lose three during conference series

The Lady Tigers faced three of the tops teams in the conference on the road last week with Mountain Home coming away with three losses.

Skyview 13, Mountain Home 1

(Five innings)

The Mountain Home Lady Tigers dropped a 1-13 conference softball game to the Lady Hawks at Skyview on April 2.

Skyview, which remains unbeaten in conference play, scored five runs in the first inning, two in the second, four in the third and two more in the fourth as they won in five innings due to the 10-run rule.

Mountain Home, who only managed three hits off two Skyview pitchers, scored their lone run in the first inning.

"They're very disciplined and very selective at the plate," said Mountain Home head softball coach Chris Asbury regarding the Skyview ladies.

While the coach expected Skyview to score some runs, "on the other hand, we've got to answer, and we've got to play a little better defense," he said. "Unfortunately, tonight, we did neither of those."

Courtney Christiansen had two hits and an RBI with Madison Siefferman making the only other hit for Mountain Home. Heather Adams suffered the loss to fall to 5-3 on the season.

Kuna 4, Mountain Home 0

Mountain Home's Heather Adams and Kuna's Nicole Arizana were involved in a good pitching duel, but Kuna was able to score four runs -- just one was earned. Meanwhile, Mountain Home couldn't get anything going offensively during a 0-4 shutout.

The Lady Tigers managed just three hits off Arizana, who struck out 12 batters.

"We had a definite lack of discipline at the plate at times today," Coach Asbury said after the game. "We did have some really good at-bats, but if you can't push a runner past second base, it makes winning the game pretty difficult."

While Kuna gave Mountain Home some opportunities, four runs don't win a whole lot of ball games, he added.

"We pitched well enough to win, we played decent defense (and) we pitched out of some jams," Asbury said. "I'm real proud of that effort, but you've got to score some runs to win the ball game."

Krissy Elliott, Brittney Karst and Maeghan Pomerantz had Mountain Home's only hits. Heather Adams, fell to 5-4 on the season despite giving up just five hits while striking out six.

Columbia 4, Mountain Home 3

The Lady Tigers grabbed an early 1-0 lead but fell behind by three before they battled back to within one in their 3-4 loss to Columbia on Friday.

Courtney Christiansen had two of the five Mountain Home hits, including a triple, while driving in a run. Brittney Karst had a solo home run, and Madison Siefferman and Teresa Fredell also had hits.

Heather Adams once again pitched well enough to win but suffered the loss, dropping to 5-5 on the season.

"I'm very proud of their effort, hanging in a close game like that and battling back," said Coach Asbury. "We were up early and squandered away the lead. But (we) fought back into it and had an opportunity in the top of the seventh to definitely tie it up... and unfortunately came up on the losing end. But I was real proud of our effort at the plate. It doesn't show with 10 strikeouts and only five hits, but we were much more disciplined at the plate than the previous night against Kuna, so we're definitely getting some work done and making definite strides towards improving."

The Lady Tigers fall to 2-4 in conference and 5-7 overall. They face Middleton and Emmett this week. They took the road Tuesday to face Middleton before they host Emmett on Thursday, April 12.

"This was by far our toughest week of the season," Coach Asbury said regarding the past three games. "As I see it, we faced the top three teams in the league in four or five days. But Middleton and Emmett are both extremely winnable games, and I fully expect we'll come out focused and come away with two more wins."