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Bulldogs win one, lose one against Panthers

Elwood Shelton

Junior Chris Field and senior Rob Satterwhite played a game of one-upmanship Saturday when they switched battery positions in a doubleheader against Delta.

Field climbed to the top of the hill for the first half of the doubleheader, and pitched his third complete game of the season. In his tour of duty, Field racked up six strikeouts, and allowed only one earned run. He also led the team in hitting in the first game, going two for two at the plate banging out a single and a triple, and walking once.

After the first inning of the second game, Satterwhite took the mound and showed the same determination that most of the team has shown in the second half of the season. The senior struck out six Delta hitters and kept the earned runs down to four. At the plate, Satterwhite went three for four, hitting his first grand slam of the season, and followed it with a solo shot late in the game. He also walked once, hit a single, and drove in five RBIs.



“The kids know the key to winning is execution, and that’s what Field and Satterwhite did when they were pitching,” Coach Kip Hafey said. “They really produced from the mound and the plate, that’s what needs to be done.”

Though both pitchers had excellent showings, only one walked away with a win. Moffat County dropped the first game 3-2, after a seventh-inning rally by the Panthers (7-7).



With one out and a runner on base, a Panther batter was able to drive a deep single into an outfield gap, scoring the winning run.

The second game also came down to the final inning.

With the bases loaded in the top of the eighth, Kevin Voorhees bunted home the winning run. They later scored off a Field single, solidifying the win for the ‘Dogs.

Delta was able to score once in bottom of the inning, but wasn’t able mimic the first game’s late rally, and the game ended 9-8.

“We missed a hit-and-run, and two squeeze plays in the first game, so it was our fault that we lost,” Hafey said. “But the way we came back and played in the second game was outstanding, it shows we’re willing to fight hard for our wins this season.”

The Bulldogs’ split at Delta improves their record to 9-6, and keeps the team in the upper-half of the Wester Slope Conference (WSC). The Delta game also marks the third doubleheader that the ‘Dogs have played in the last four games.

The pressure of playing two games in one day seems to have put Moffat County back on the winning track, gaining all but one of its conference wins from doubleheaders.

The Bulldogs will break from the two-game stretch at 3 p.m. today, when they attempt to win a one game match-up at Rifle. The rescheduled game is a make-up for an April 10 game, and is the second meeting between the two teams.

Moffat County will most likely face the Bears’ ace, senior Brian Beecraft. Beecraft is an off-speed pitcher, with 21 strikeouts on the year, and has an ERA of 5.08. He is also the power in the Bears’ lineup, hitting .475, with 18 RBI.

Hafey doesn’t foresee Rifle’s ace presenting much of a problem for his team, feeling as though the ‘Dogs hitting has been tested, and has seen the full gambit of what the WSC offers pitching-wise.

“We’ve gone up against every kind of pitcher this year and have remained consistent against all of them, so I think that makes a statement on how we’re batting,” Hafey said.

The Bulldogs’ integrity at the plate this season hasn’t placed blinders on the team or coach for the last games of the season. With only three conference games left before districts, they are looking at each game as a step to closing in on their ultimate goal.

“Our goal at the beginning of the season was state, but we can’t look past the last three league games. Right now we’ve got to keep our goals at winning one game at a time,” he said.


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