BY NATE KOTISSO | STAFF WRITER
MERCEDES — Brownsville Veterans left-hander Mia Anzaldua pitched the full seven innings, giving up one hit, walking three and striking out nine Mercedes hitters in a 2-0 victory Friday night at Mercedes softball field.
The win created a little more separation for the Lady Chargers (17-6, 9-0), who now have a two-game lead on the Lady Tigers (15-6, 7-2) in the District 32-5A standings with five district games remaining.
“In a game like this, you always want to play a good team and, obviously, Brownsville Veterans is a good team,” Mercedes assistant coach David Gonzales said. “It was just timely hitting. Both pitchers on both sides pitching a really good game, and they were just able to score when they put the ball in play.”
The Lady Chargers got on the board early in the first. Lydia Fernandez led off with a walk, stole second base, advanced to third on a passed ball and scored on a groundout by Cassie Valdez two batters later to put Brownsville Veterans ahead 1-0. In the sixth, Valdez singled for her only hit of the game and swiped second. Next up was the pitcher Anzaldua, who flared a base hit to center field, allowing Valdez to touch home for the game’s final margin.
Both Anzaldua and Mercedes right-hander Felicia Garza carried no-hitters into the fourth inning. Garza was well aware of the magnitude of Friday night’s game.
“We all came ready to play,” Garza said. “We knew that this was going to be a hard team to play, so we gave it our all from the beginning to the end. But we didn’t pull through.”
Garza dazzled on the mound for the Lady Tigers, allowing two runs on three hits and two walks with eight strikeouts in seven innings. Garza’s two walks came in the first inning and led to Fernandez scoring the game’s first run.
“I was ready to go out there,” Garza said. “In the first inning, I was really nervous, and I walked two girls. But my nerves shook off when the innings progressed. After the first inning of every game, I just shake off the jitters anyway.”
Mercedes had a couple of opportunities to manufacture some offense. With one out in the fourth, Garza walked, and pinch runner Emily Trevino replaced her at first. Cleanup hitter Erin Ramirez singled to right field. Trevino attempted to go from first to third and was thrown out at third base. The fourth ended without a run. The Lady Tigers put runners in scoring position in the fifth and sixth innings only to come up empty.
“The good thing about this game is we’ll be able to work on situations where we did not produce in practice,” Gonzales said.
The opportunity of overtaking the Lady Chargers in the standings seems out of reach at this point in the season. Gonzales says his team’s vision is no different than it was before the game.
“Every game is important in our district, whether it’s Veterans or Edcouch-Elsa,” Gonzales said. “We don’t look past the next game. We still have five more games to go. Until we get to that fifth game, then we’ll start looking past that. Right now, just like we told the girls, we have to keep on chugging along, take care of business and everything else will fall into place.”