Ponies ready for a fight with Panthers

Coming into Thursday night's game at Glasgow, the Havre High softball team had yet to find its groove. But after an impressive road win, it appears the Blue Ponies are on track to find it soon enough.

Following consecutive losses at the Belgrade Invitational last Saturday, the Ponies responded in a big way with a 9-1 defeat of the Glasgow Scotties, a team that beat HHS 6-4 in Havre to open the season back on Mar. 24. The loss was also the first of the year for Glasgow.

Havre, which improved to 4-4 overall, got off to a hot start, grabbing a 6-1 lead after the sixth inning before adding on three more runs in the top of the seventh to put the game out of reach. HHS got an outstanding pitching effort from Dani Wagner as she limited the Glasgow offense to just one run in seven innings, earning the win and throwing a complete game in the process.

"Everything that could have went right for us did," HHS co-head coach Mark Majeres said. "We hit the ball well. We played really good defense, I don't think we had an error tonight and Dani pitched a great game."

After their beat down of the Scotties, the Ponies will look to keep their winning ways going as they will welcome Belgrade, one of the top teams in the Central A, into the Sixth Avenue Memorial Field on Saturday for an important conference doubleheader. The first game will be at 2 p.m., with the second to follow at 4 p.m.

"Belgrade is a very good team," HHS co-head coach Bob Evans Sr. said. "We are really going to have to get some strong pitching and play some good defense because Belgrade will test you. You don't see their players going back to the dugout after striking out very often. They do a great job of putting the ball into play."

Squaring off against Belgrade will be nothing new for Havre, as the Ponies lost to the Panthers 11-2 last weekend. But even though HHS struggled to compete against Belgrade a week ago, Evans feels his team is more than capable of hanging tough.

"Obviously it would be huge for us to get a split or a sweep," Evans said. "But the biggest thing for us is to show that we can compete against good teams. Belgrade is one of the better teams we will play and we will have to beat teams just like them down the road. So we need to show we can step up and go head-to-head against them."

As always, solid pitching will be essential for the Ponies if they want to have a shot at knocking off Belgrade and that means that pitchers Dani Wagner and Paige Henderson will need to be at the top of their game.

Henderson, who plays shortstop when she is not pitching, is also one of Havre's top defensive players, as is Wagner, who is a stellar center fielder when she is not on the mound.

"Dani and Paige have both pitched well, they just don't have a lot of experience," Evans said. "So we just need to get Belgrade to put the ball in play and our defense needs to make some plays behind them."

While Wagner and Henderson are important on the mound and in the field, they are also the Ponies' most dangerous weapons offensively. Wagner is currently hitting .400 so far this season with a total of 10 hits, two of them home runs. She also has nine runs batted in.

Henderson is off to an equally roaring start as she is hitting .480 to go along with two homers and seven RBI's. Right Fielder Jacey McDonald is another key part of the Pony offense with a .455 batting average as well as six RBI's. Catcher Shania Carlson also hits better than .400 and is fourth on the team in RBI's with five.

"We need to make sure we are smart at the plate, being patient and not swinging at bad pitches," Evans said. "But these are important games for us. We want to finish in the top two in the conference and we need to win games like this to be able to do that."

Havre and Belgrade will play back-to-back games Saturday with the opening game starting at 2 p.m. Both games will be at the Sixth Avenue Memorial Field.