Showing no signs of slowing down, the Wetumpka softball team snatched a 7-5 win over Opelika last Wednesday.
Through the early stretch of the season, Wetumpka has dominated everyone that has come across its path. Heading into the matchup with Opelika, Wetumpka posted a 4-1 record. After the game, Wetumpka strung together five straight to bring them to 10-1 on the season.
Against the Bulldogs, senior Lily Davenport led the way with three hits and two runs while also notching her 200th career varsity hit in her first at-bat.
“Lily's a three, four-year starter for us now,” Wetumpka coach Daryl Otwell said. “She's part of our state championship run team and was part of a lot of our success last year in our deep state tournament team. That's one thing she's got to do, and she's done it. She's done it her whole career here. She's had the big hits and she's doing a great job. Anytime you're a senior, everyone wants that quick first start. She has swung the bat really well to start here and just had really good at-bats. Even her outs have been really hard-hit balls. She's really starting her year off hot and hopefully she can keep that going.”
Ava Farmer also logged two hits and one run while Taylor Carlise and Alyssa Brown ended the night with two RBIs apiece.
Currently, the Indians are a mixture of both young and old but have not shown any weakness in this early part of the season. Not only do the Indians already have 10 wins on the year, but they have also scored 10 or more runs in five of those games.
“They're having really good at-bats,” Otwell said. “They're seeing a lot of pitches. They're hitting the ball hard. They're making the defense make plays. We hang our hats on base running, we're very athletic, we run the bases good, we're a fast team. We try to put a lot of pressure on defenses. And, so far to start the year, we've had some good, timely hitting. We've had some girls really, from top to bottom, just have really good at-bats.”
This dominance in the early stretch, and especially against good teams, was all part of the plan for Otwell. He scheduled difficult opponents to make sure Wetumpka was not only ready for its new area this year but to also make an impact once the playoffs roll around.
“I know it's kind of cliche, but with such a young team, and we got a lot of learning to do and a lot of these games early on, just builds that confidence,” Otwell said. “Trying to get them the reps and really try to get prepared for postseason-type play. We're challenging them with tough teams, Opelika is a great team, a big 7A school. We're trying to play some good teams that can kind of create what we're going to see in an area slash regional format.”
