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GREENFIELD — Nodaway Valley’s defense wiggled out of a jam in the top of the second and used that momentum for a big bottom half of the stanza at the plate en route to an 11-1 five-inning win over visiting Orient-Macksburg Wednesday evening in non-conference softball at Greenfield.
The win marked the fourth for the Wolverines in the last seven days. NV first beat Diagonal for its second win of the season last Wednesday, then defeated Melcher-Dallas in O-M’s tournament last weekend before beating Bedford Monday night. Each of the wins were by mercy rule.
In Wednesday’s home win over the Bulldogs, Nodaway Valley scored six runs in the bottom half of the second on six hits and one O-M error. Later on, the Wolverines drove in five in the fifth inning. In all, eight of NV’s nine hitters recorded at least one hit in the outing.
“We just started line driving her. We actually have some good hitters all the way through the lineup. You just don’t know which one’s going to show up,” NV head coach Carol Baudler said. “They just had some nice line drive hits.”
Nodaway Valley freshman Natalie Yonker earned the win in the pitcher’s circle, striking out one, walking four and allowing four hits to total one earned run given up. The run came for O-M on an RBI double in the top of the third by Kaela Eslinger. The Wolverines were led offensively by three hits from McKynli Newbury.
“Natalie’s doing a good job getting the ball inside or outside of the plate,” Baudler said. “Our defense is starting to step up and make the plays and not the errors. We’re able to get a few more wins in that way.”
Following a trip Friday to Martensdale-St. Marys, the Wolverines are home this weekend for their own tournament. The eight-team affair also includes O-M. Other teams participating include Van Meter, Coon Rapids-Bayard, Earlham, Shenandoah, Cumberland-Anita-Massena and Logan-Magnolia. The Wolverines open the day with an 11:45 a.m. game against CR-B. O-M opens its day at 10 a.m. against Van Meter.
“There’ll be some really good teams on Saturday. It almost seems like there’s kind of a split with four really good teams and four teams that are maybe struggling a little bit,” Baudler said. “We just need to show up, hit the ball and play defense.”