The saying goes that all good things must come to an end.

Unfortunately for the Incline High School varsity softball team, it ended on a sour note.

The Lady Highlanders dropped a pair of games Saturday, 17-6 and 11-0, to Pershing County High School, the final set of games for Incline this season.

With the losses, the Lady Highlanders finished the season on a three-game losing streak, as it lost earlier in the week to Portola High School.

Still, the team finished 12-6 on the year, a drastic improvement from recent seasons, said Incline coach Del Youngblood, seasons in which Incline has suffered double-digit losses, many via the mercy rule.

“We finished 12-6 this season, and that’s a really good year,” Youngblood said. “We did learn a lot as a team, and we did make a lot of progress from the last three or four years.”

In game one, Incline erased a 3-0 lead early, scoring four runs in the bottom of the first inning to take a 4-3 lead. However, poor fielding and pitching led to an Incline collapse, Youngblood said.

Lovelock scored six runs each in the second and third inning, and two more in the fourth, to finish the five-inning game up 11.

“As far as Saturday is concerned, the pitching was pathetic,” Youngblood said. “And our defense was just as bad.”

Senior pitcher Ashley Ford, one of the senior leaders of Incline’s revived softball program this year, picked up the loss, ending her season with an 8-4 record.
Tracy Estrada and Lauren Wilson each had two hits, while Lindsey Warfield, Michaela Wright and Rebecca Corpuel added one.

In game two, errors again led to the loss, Youngblood said.

“We had five errors in the first game and four in the second game,” he said. “You’re not going to win many games doing that.”

Freshman Anisha Wilson lost the game, dropping her season record to 4-2.

“Lovelock is well-balanced, they are well-coached and they play really, really hard,” Youngblood said.

Warfield had two hits in game two, while Sydney Perkins and Kerry Walsh each had one.