By MARK MOLINA | STAFF WRITER
Brownsville Veterans Memorial senior catcher Harley Morales recorded a single hit against the Mercedes Lady Tigers, but it would be the most important one of the night.
With two out and the go-ahead runner on third in the bottom of the sixth inning, Morales hit an RBI single shot to right-center field as shortstop Cassie Valdez crossed the plate for what proved to be the winning run as the Lady
Chargers topped the Lady Tigers 3-2 in District 32-5A play Tuesday night at Brownsville Veterans High School.
Prior to the hit, junior pitcher Mia Anzaldua struck out swinging for the second out of the inning, but Morales stayed cool heading to the plate.
“I was just thinking get on base and bring the runner in because that’s all I had to do,” Morales said. “I was just watching the ball out of the pitcher’s hand. I saw it, hit it and just hoped it was a base hit.”
Morales finished the game going 1 for 3 at the plate, but had two RBIs in the clutch as she hit a sac fly to deep center field to tie the game at 2-2 in the bottom of the fourth inning.
Also stepping up was Anzaldua, who finished the game with 11 strikeouts, including the final five Mercedes batters in a row and gave up three hits and no earned runs.
“Mercedes is a program with a lot of history and we’re a program starting our history,” Lady Charger head coach Rayner Cardenas said. “We measure ourselves against teams like that. We come out and we want to win and play our best. They bring the best out of us. We knew it was going to be a tough game and it meant a lot to both sides.
“Our girls came in clutch when they needed to, made the key plays, key hits, throw outs and the key hit … I couldn’t be prouder of them.”
With the win, Brownsville Veterans improves to 9-0 and has a two-game lead on 7-2 Mercedes.
Anzaldua now has 21 strikeouts in two meetings with the Lady Tigers and 31 in the last three games dating back to last season.
Mercedes pitcher Mika Vento had a solid outing with eight strikeouts and five scoreless innings, giving up just four hits in the loss.
Despite the effort, it was miscues cost Mercedes in the sixth inning.
Valdez got into scoring position in the sixth after a double to left center and a bad throw back to the infield allowed her to get to third base.
“We didn’t execute and really it was one error that we had that really magnified the game,” Mercedes coach Kristy Leal said. “We just have to execute. At the end, we weren’t following our game plan.”
The Lady Tigers took advantage of some Lady Charger flubs in the top of the third after a pair of errors put runners on second and third with one out.
Sam Flores put down a bunt and brought in Karina Zamora and a passed ball on the next at-bat opened the door for Kassidie Rodriguez to come home and make it 2-0.
With one on and no outs in the bottom of the fourth, Anzaldua hit a fly ball to right field, but outfielder Angelique Rangel could not come up with the routine play, allowing Valdez to score for Brownsville Veterans and make it 2-1.
Morales hit a sac fly on the next at-bat to bring in Anzaldua and tied the game.
Mercedes looked to get back on the board after Rangel got on base on an error at first base to open the sixth, but Morales would throw her out at second base and Anzaldua got out of the inning soon after.
Morales would come up with another throw out at second, this time catching Natalie Trevino in the top of the sixth.
Anzaldua picked up three-straight strikeouts to end the game. She faced nine Mercedes batters in the final three innings.
“Those innings where we scored two runs, we followed our game plan, but we strayed away from it after the error that magnified (everything),” Leal said. “We weren’t attacking (at the plate) and that’s something you can’t do against great pitchers like Mia or Cassie. You can’t let them ahead in the count. You have to attack them, so that was that.”