KELLER – Guyer had no choice but to win Friday night and despite battling from behind the entire night the Lady Wildcats couldn’t muster the offense to force a decisive Game 3 in their Class 4A Region I quarterfinal series with Joshua.

DRC/Gary Payne

Joshua's Ashley Clifton (10) and Guyer catcher Caitlin Christopher collide at home plate during a high school playoff softball game in Keller, Friday, May 9, 2008. Clifton was able to score on the play.

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Guyer kept a raucous crowd on its feet until the final out of the seventh inning, but a hard ground ball to third put the finishing touches on a 7-3 Lady Owl win and ended a phenomenal year for the Lady Wildcats.

Joshua (28-6) made the most of three Guyer errors to put up four runs in the first frame and the Lady Wildcats clawed their way back to 5-3, but that was as close as they got.

“The girls played hard,” Guyer head coach Keith Medford said. “We could have given up after giving up four runs in the first, but they continued to battle and that’s a tribute to their leadership. We’re a young team, but we never thought that this is the last three outs of the season.”

A wild first inning saw two Guyer errors in the first two at-bats of the game. Joshua leadoff hitter Candice Gauntt drove a base hit to right that skipped past Layne Greenlee and allowed Guantt to advance to third and score on a fielder’s choice to shortstop.

Kayci Wilson, Ashley Clifton and Caitlin Force had consecutive base hits for the Lady Owls with one out in the first, but a base running mistake by Clifton left her stranded between second and third on Force’s single.

Lady Wildcat catcher Caitlin Christopher’s throw to second was too late, but Wilson scored and shortstop Amber Gonzales got the easy out at first. Clifton also saw an opportunity to sneak home on the play and Lindsey Vochoska’s throw to the plate and the Christopher tag both seemed to come in plenty of time to get the out, but Clifton was ruled safe at the plate to give Joshua the early 4-0 lead.

“That’s one of those in-between balls where we didn’t think we had a play at the plate,” Medford said. “You have to get an out. We should have got two, but unfortunately we didn’t. It happens.”

Guyer showed poise in the bottom half of the first as it bounced back to load the bases up with two outs. Wilson was excellent on the mound for the Lady Owls and she struck out Kayla Mellinger to end the early threat.

“We had an opportunity to score some runs there and we just didn’t get it done,” Medford said. “Hats off to [Wilson]; she battled back and found the strike zone.”

Joshua pushed another run across in the third before the Lady Wildcats found themselves in a position to do some damage in the third frame. Kylee Krosek led off with a base hit and worked her way to third on a Greenlee single that put runners at the corners. Krosek scored on wild pitch and a Christopher single put runners back at first and third.

The Lady Owls gave Christopher second base and Amanda Wells drove a base hit into left field that scored Greenlee, but a tremendous throw from left field cut down Christopher at the plate for the second out of the inning. Kayla Mellinger drove in Wells, but got caught trying to take second base on her drive to right field to end the frame at 5-3.

Guyer only managed two more hits and never had a runner reach second base the rest of the way.

Crosek and Christopher both had a pair of hits, while Wells and Mellinger finished with an RBI apiece.

The season didn’t end quite the way the Lady Wildcats would have wanted, but after the game the Guyer skipper couldn’t hide how happy he was with the year his young team had.

“I’m extremely proud of this team,” Medford said. “It was a disappointing night, but we’re not disappointed with the season we had.”

Joshua 7, Guyer 3

Joshua  401            010            1            --            7            10            0

Guyer   003            000            0            --            3            8            3

WP – Kayci Wilson. LP – Kylee Crosek. 2B – G: Crosek. HR – J: Ashley Clifton. Records – Joshua 28-6. Guyer 24-13-1