The Lady Raiders of Benton Academy took Greenville Christian down 13-3 for the second time this season on Tuesday before heavy rain storms ended the chance for a B game.
Greenville Christian kicked off the game with a leadoff double, but pitcher Gracie Manor worked her way out of the jam and sent the Lady Raiders to the bottom of the first inning unscathed.
In the bottom of the inning, Avery Eldridge led things off by being hit with a pitch, and after a pair of steals and an error by GCS, she took home plate to give the Lady Raiders a 1-0 lead, one they would not lose.
Benton came back in the second inning and scored two runs to extend their lead to 3-0.
GCS finally got some momentum in the top of the third after three straight hits allowed them to score a run to cut the lead to 3-1, but Benton came back and put up five runs in the bottom of the third to push their lead to 8-1.
The Lady Saints were a resilient group, however, and they didn’t give up. They were able to put two more runs on the board in the top of the fourth inning to make it an 8-3 game, but Benton promptly shut the door closed in the bottom of the fifth with five more runs, making the final score 13-3.
The win brought Benton’s overall record to 9-6 and their conference record to 5-2.
To this point, Benton has already surpassed what they had done the previous season, but their sights are still set higher.
Benton Academy head softball coach Adam Dixon believes they’ve continued to improve as the season has gone on.
“We’ve gotten a lot better and continue to get better every week,” Dixon said. “We won seven games last year, so we’ve already eclipsed that. Our pitching is getting stronger with Catie Merrell when she’s able to pitch and with Gracie Manor. We’re hitting the ball better. We hit a little bit of a dip in our offense the past few games, and I don’t see that continuing. You have a couple of games every year when that happens, and we’re hitting it better now. We’ve taken care of business when we need to.”
Benton will participate in their final weekend tournament of the regular season on Saturday when they travel to Carroll Academy.
The Lady Raiders will be pitted against Carroll Academy, Winston Academy, and Magnolia Heights.
All three of the teams are a bit of an unknown for the Lady Raiders this season, so it will help mimic the rigors of tournament play in the upcoming postseason.
“One of the reasons I scheduled it is to help prepare for tournament play,” Dixon said. “Playing against the number one team in the division on Monday (Tri-County) isn’t ideal, but we may find ourselves in that type of situation at North State. It will give us a chance to give pitchers work. At the end of the day, we’re going to win, but it doesn’t affect our season outcome. We’re going to play quality teams and will have to play solid softball to win. We’ll gain necessary experience by playing quality teams.”
Even with the tournament in front of them, the match-up that looms on Benton’s schedule is with rival and division opponent Tri-County Academy. In the first game between them, the Lady Rebels won 15-2 in dominating fashion.
The reigning state champions will provide Benton with a massive opportunity to gauge how far they’ve come this season.
“We started off well against them the first time, but it got a little out of hand towards the end,” Dixon said. “That’s a team that is extremely well-coached and experienced. They’re a lot younger than they were last year, but they play ball all summer long. They continue to play when our season is over. The ultimate goal is to win the ball game, but the main goal for us is to play better than we did the game or week before. We want to get better. We want to go over there and play a full game of softball because I don’t think we played a full game against them last time.”
The first pitch at Tri-County is set for 5:30 p.m.
