Round Rock pounded Temple 9-1 on Thursday night at Tem-Cat Field to take Game 1 of the best-of-three bi-district series.
Game 2 is at 6 p.m. today in Round Rock. If necessary, Game 3 will be 30 minutes following. The winner advances to the area round to face Klein or The Woodlands.
“We did not play well enough to win tonight,” Temple coach Steve Prentiss said. “I’ve got to find a way to get them better. I did not do a good enough job tonight to get them ready to play, to win.
“The good news is we don’t get to sulk on this too long.”
If the Tem-Cats (10-20) hope to knock off the District 14-5A tri-champion Lady Dragons (16-9), they’ll need to discover some offense.
Round Rock pitcher Sarah Rabey shut down Temple, striking out 12 and allowing just one unearned run.
The Tem-Cats recorded four hits - a pair of hits in the first and sixth innings.
“(Rabey) did a great job tonight and struck out a lot of batters,” Prentiss said. “We chased some pitches we probably shouldn’t have chased.”
The Tem-Cats’ strikeouts came at the most inopportune times.
Temple cut Round Rock’s lead to 2-1 in the first inning on first baseman Kacie Easley’s RBI double to left.
With Easley on second and center fielder Jordan Valentin on third, Rabey struck out three straight Tem-Cats to end the inning.
Rabey did a similar thing in the sixth, with Easley on second and catcher Clarissa Villanueva on first.
Rabey once again struck out three batters to get out of the jam.
“We practice hitting the ball, not striking out,” Prentiss said. “Things just didn’t go our way tonight.”
Easley was the only Tem-Cat to record more than one hit, going 2-for-3 with an RBI.
Temple didn’t make things any easier for itself on defense, committing four errors that led to four Round Rock runs.
Two of those unearned runs came in the sixth, when the Lady Dragons added to their four-run advantage with a four-run inning.
Those errors contributed to a shaky start by freshman pitcher Elisa Espinoza, who gave up 13 hits and allowed nine runs - five earned.
Espinoza is expected to pitch Game 2.
Despite a rough first game, Prentiss believes his team is still capable of upsetting the Lady Dragons.
“If this team has shown me one thing, it’s that they don’t give up,” Prentiss said. “I feel like we can go out there (today) and put out a good effort and give Round Rock a better game.”
