Dixie Heights approaches each and every game with the same mindset.
They’re not going to lose because of their defense.
It was a defensive play in the top of the fifth inning that ended a Notre Dame rally and the Colonels rallied for five runs after Carly Waters diving catch in right, defeating the Pandas 8-4 on Wednesday.
“We’ve been talking about defense for quite some time. Defense has always been our ‘M.O.’ Our mentality right now is hate to lose because of defense,” Colonels coach Sarah Osborne said. “You got to make the plays that it’s going to help your pitcher out. It’s going to get us to the next inning and get us out of jams.”
Waters diving snag prevented two runs from scoring after Rachel Finke’s two-out, two-run double tied the game up at three. She stayed down after the play after a collision with her sister and second baseman Haley Waters, but eventually came up and had an ice bag after the game.
“Two outs, bases loaded, I had to get there. Had to catch the ball. My sister came over on top of me, neither of us called for it so that is going to happen,” Carly Waters said. “If our offense isn’t on, our defense is always there and has to be there.”
The Colonels plated two in the bottom of fifth, one on a Riley Hopkins double and another on a Panda error, Notre Dame’s defense tallying five errors in the game.
“Mentally we kind of lost focus on what we were doing. Things we do everyday in practice. Taking care of the fundamentals, defensively we had a couple of mental breakdowns from our seniors all the way down to our younger players,” Pandas coach Joe Stephenson said.
Dixie added three more runs in the bottom half of the sixth for insurance, Waters scoring on an error, Skylar Mitchell with an RBI double and Ella Steczynski scoring on a Sydney Schumacher bunt single.
The Colonels won the game without their ace pitcher in Hopkins, Osborne electing to start the game with Ava Niemer and Valkyrie Ison finishing the game in relief to get the win. Niemer pitched 4.2 innings, allowing four hits and two earned runs while striking out two and walking five. Ison went the final 2.1, allowing a hit, earned run and walked two.
The Colonels collected 11 hits in the contest, Mitchell finishing with three hits and scoring two runs, Hopkins with two hits and two RBI and Schumacher also with two hits. Taylor Ingram’s triple in the first got Dixie on the board, Hopkins following with an RBI single.
“I was relaxed, with runners on base I need to be productive and move them around,” Hopkins said. “It always feels good to get those hits and drive people in.”
Ella Steczynski’s RBI single in the fourth gave the Colonels a 3-1 lead.
“This was a big win for us. We’re trying to get on a roll and this could be the start of that,” Osborne said.
The Pandas tallied five hits on the day, three of them for extra bases. Tori Danneman had two hits, one of them a triple with two runs scored. Ava Auberger had a run scoring triple in the first to get the Pandas an early 1-0 lead, Finke’s two-run double coming in the fifth to tie things up at three.
Abby Turnpaugh took the loss in the circle, pitching a complete game with 11 hits allowed, six earned runs and struck out six with a walk and hit by pitch.
It was just Notre Dame’s second loss of the season, dropping to 5-2. Weather has derailed a lot of early season games, but they’re now in the thick of their schedule with 15 games on the docket over the next three and a half weeks.
“Have to work on our fundamentals and build on our fundamentals and get that where it’s at its best here in a few weeks. We just need to point out what we did good and what we did bad and grow from it,” Stephenson said.
Notre Dame hosts Simon Kenton on Thursday.
Dixie Heights begins play in the Bart Rison Classic at Montgomery County on Friday with Pulaski County. They’ll follow with Pendleton County and George Rogers Clark on Saturday.
NOTRE DAME — 100-020-1 — 4-5-5
DIXIE HEIGHTS — 200-123-x — 8-11-1
2B — (ND) Finke (DH) Mitchell, Hopkins
3B — (ND) Auberger, Danneman (DH) Ingram
WP — Ison. LP — Turnpaugh.
Records: Notre Dame 5-2, Dixie Heights 8-9