FREDDY GONZALEZ | Staff Writer
SAN BENITO — It was the game everybody marked on their calendars once the softball schedules were released and it didn’t disappoint. Everything everyone expected was present.
Playoff atmosphere, check.
Plenty of action, check.
Fireworks at the end, double check.
After 18 long years of donning the purple and gold, new Harlingen South head coach Elias Martinez returned to San Benito for the first time and saw his Lady Hawks fall 9-2 to the Lady Greyhounds on Tuesday evening.
The win pushed San Benito to 20-0 overall, 6-0 in District 32-6A. The loss, meanwhile, dropped Harlingen South to 14-5 overall and 3-3 in district action.
However, despite the victory, first-year San Benito head coach Kristy Leal was not pleased with her team’s defensive display.
“We strung a lot of runs in and hit the ball pretty well. However, defensively we were not very sound today and that’s not our play at all,” she said. “I think we lacked a little bit there, but it helps when you score runs because it picks up the errors you made.”
After Harlingen South went scoreless in the first inning, the Lady ’Hounds’ offense quickly picked up steam.
With runners on second and third, left fielder Deztiny Hernandez took her first pitch and crushed the ball to the center field, bringing in Sarah Garcia and Kim Harper, giving the Greyhounds an early 2-0 lead.
But the runs didn’t stop coming.
After the Lady Hawks went three-and-out in their half of the second, San Benito went to work again and scored two more runs after a double RBI from Harper scored Audrey Huerta and Garcia to stretch the lead to 4-0.
Harlingen South made things interesting in the top of the third. With runners on second and third base, Lady Hawks’ first baseman Ashley Reyna hit a grounder down the center of the park to bring home Jasmine Gallegos and Ashley Galvan, cutting San Benito’s lead to 4-2.
Unfortunately for South, that was as close as the Lady Hawks would come.
In the bottom of the fifth the Lady ’Hounds once again scored on a double RBI from Diandra Padilla.
After pushing the lead to 7-2, the night got a little worse for the Lady Hawks.
In the sixth, with two outs and a runner on first, San Benito third baseman Joanna Gonzalez blasted a rocket out of the park that cleared the Lady Greyhounds dugout as the team waited for her at home plate.
Next up, San Benito plays Brownsville Rivera on Thursday at 7 p.m., while Harlingen South hosts Harlingen at 7 p.m.