Great Bend Post Sports
The Lady Panther softball team closed out the regular season at home Tuesday with a pair of wins against TMP. Great Bend ends the regular season with a record of 20-6 and currently sits as the No. 3 seed in the 5A west regional bracket. The top four teams in the regional will host playoff action. Topeka Seaman (19-6) and Valley Center (17-6) have games scheduled on Thursday.
Great Bend took game one against the Monarchs 12-2. TMP opened with a run in the first inning but the Lady Panthers answered with two runs in the bottom of the frame, then piled on four more runs in the second. Great Bend scored in all six at bats to set up the run-rule win after six innings.
The win was bookended by home runs from Paige Thexton and Alyssa McCauley. Thexton's lead-off homer in the first inning tied the game, and Camdyn Post singled and scored in the opening inning. With the game all but decided in the sixth, McCauley's home run pushed the Panther lead to 10 runs to invoke the run-rule.
Six of the 13 Lady Panther hits went for extra bases in the win. DeShawnna Bryant finished with four hits, including a double, to drive in three runs and score three times. McCauley added a single on the day. Thexton walked in her final three at bats, scoring three runs in the game. Denver Ringo singled, tripled, and walked twice. Kamryn Koelsch doubled and drove in two, and Kya Behr doubled with an RBI and run scored. Halle Post singled and drove in two.
Braelyn Turner pitched all six innings for the win. The sophomore struck out six and allowed two earned runs on five hits.
The Lady Panthers took game two 10-0. Great Bend scored in the first and third innings to lead 2-0 before scratching across four runs in the fourth. Behr paced the offense with three hits, including a pair of doubles, driving in a run and scoring twice. Bryant singled and drove in three runs. Halle Post singled twice, and Chayla Prendergast knocked in the final two runs of the game on a double to push the Panther lead to 10 and end the game early.
The freshman Prendergast was also effective in the circle with five strikeouts and just two hits allowed.