Highland gets long-awaited win at Pekin

PACKWOOD ? Traditional SEISC north division contenders Pekin and Highland have had their share of battles that went a long way toward deciding the conference title.

Highland entered Tuesday a perfect 7-0 in league play and finally shook the Panthers by completing a season sweep and winning on Pekin?s home field for the first time since 2006.

?I don?t what it is, but this It has been a horrible place for us to play,? said Highland head coach Carrie Wieland, whose team also won a 7-1 game against the conference rival in the season opener. ?It?s definitely good to just come in and get the monkey off our back this year.?

The Huskies took advantage of early Pekin errors and won a weather-shortened 6-2 game to improve to 8-0 in the SEISC north, 14-4 overall. Highland tacked on one more run in the top of the seventh to lead 7-2, and the Panthers (6-6, 3-5 SEISC north) had one runner on with one out in the bottom half when lightning halted any sort of rally.

The Panthers committed a total of seven errors in six innings, four of those coming in the first three innings to allow Highland to open a 4-0 lead. Taylor Vonnahme came up with an RBI single up the middle to score Paige Wieland and put the Huskies on top for good in the first inning. Kelsey Doreo hit a sacrifice fly and Allison Sojka scored on an error moments later to make the score 3-0 after two innings.

?Too many defensive mistakes, which has been our bugaboo throughout the first part of the year,? said Pekin head coach Bryan Marlay. ?We?re playing better, hitting better, running the bases aggressively, but we have to shore-up the defense and not give extra outs.?

Highland scored a total of three unearned runs on five hits, and crossed the plate at least once in each of the first five innings.

?We just do what we can to put the ball in play, and sometimes it?s all you can do,? Wieland said. ?Our base running was poor all around, so I think we should have even scored more than we did.?

Courtesy runner Veronica Payne took three bases on a Highland error to get the Panthers on the board in the third. Katilin Spilman drove in Tori Davis in the fourth to finally Husky starter Mariah Freel.

Freel gave up five hits, struck out four and didn?t give up another run the rest of the way. The junior also drove in two runs while Sojka finished 2-4 with two runs scored.

Leslie Stone was tagged for three earned runs, five hits and struck out four for Pekin. Jessi Martin was 1-3 at the plate and was on board for the Panthers in the bottom of the seventh. Tori Davis and Dominique Tolle were both 1-2 with doubles.

Fairfield vs. Highland

Highland ? 1 2 1 1 1 0 X ? 7 5 2

Pekin ? 0 0 1 1 0 0 X ? 2 5 7

PEKIN ? Martin 1-3; Lankford 0-3; Tolle 1-2, BB, 2B; Baker 0-3; Davis 1-2, BB, 2B, R; Jensen 1-3; Spilman 0-3, RBI; Johnson 1-3; Stone 0-1, BB; Molkenthin 0-1; Payne R

Pitching ? Stone (L) 6 INN, 5H, 3BB, 4K, 3ER