Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Tragedy leaves Lady Stings ‘emotionally exhausted’

By Joshua Buckley
The Daily News
Published March 25, 2009

TEXAS CITY — After what many of the Texas City softball players have been dealing with the past few days, it was hard to fault the Lady Stings for not being completely focused for their district game Tuesday.

Seventeen-year-old Samantha Romero, a junior at Texas City High School, was killed when the car she was riding in was hit from behind on FM 1765 in La Marque on Saturday. Texas City coach Amber Maier said the tragedy was on the softball team’s mind when it was defeated by Angleton, 4-0.

“I’m not sure we would have won this game anyway, but I think it definitely hurt us,” Maier said. “We had several girls that were good friends with her, and they are mentally and emotionally exhausted. Softball is one of those sports that is 80-percent mental and 20-percent physical. If you are not mentally into a game, it can really spiral on you.”

Texas City (9-13 overall, 2-3 district) hung tough with district-leader Angleton through the first three innings, with ace pitcher Crystal Alaniz on the mound. But things began to come unraveled in the fourth.

Two Texas City errors opened the door for Kim Damien to drive in Angleton’s first run on an RBI-triple. Damien later scored on a fielder’s choice, giving the Lady Wildcats a 2-0 lead.

Angleton (16-5, 5-0) added another run in the fifth and sixth innings, both coming off errors. In all, the Lady Stings committed five errors.

“We started off strong, but (Angleton) is a very good hitting team,” Maier said. “We made a couple of mistakes and they made us pay for them.”

Read the full story HERE.

No comments:

LinkWithin

Blog Widget by LinkWithin