Knights swinging well
Royal senior Madison Ortega-Sanchez leads the Knights in RBI this season with 14. The senior was named the WIAA Athlete of the Week on Thursday
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/AVA LAWRENCE
Royal junior Randi Allred catches a pitch at home plate during a Knight game this season. Allred has scored 12 runs this season.
Royal senior Addi Lawrence stands near second base. Lawrence has batted in 11 runs this season.
ROYAL CITY – Averaging 15.2 runs per game this season, the Royal High School softball team has begun the 2023 campaign on a strong note.
Over the first six games, the Knights have only allowed one run this season, which came in a 17-1 win over Naches Valley.
“We have a great combination of girls with some travel ball experience combined with girls with just true athletic talent,” Head Coach Lisa Lawrence said. “The combination has really worked well in our lineup.”
Seniors Madison Ortega-Sanchez (14) and Addi Lawrence (11) lead the team in RBI, while junior Raegan Wardenaar has a team-high five home runs – four of which came inside the park in the matchup against Connell on Tuesday.
“We were joking that (Wardenaar) must have broken some sort of record on that,” Lawrence said.
The Knights have recorded 68 hits, batted in 74 runs and stolen 19 bases through the first six games.
“The team has really come out hitting well all the way around from the leadoff to the last batter in the lineup,” Lawrence said. “Everybody’s been strong and making solid contact. That’s been really helpful and leading to our wins.”
Ortega-Sanchez, who was named an Athlete of the Week by the WIAA on Thursday, has had strong appearances inside the pitching circle this season. The senior has struck out 27 of her 38 batters faced.
“She’s leading the team in a lot of things, between her pitching and her strong performances at-bat,” Lawrence said. “She’s definitely a leader on the team.”
Even with the dominant wins, the Knights are still looking to keep improving as they enter a tough slate of games. Royal traveled to Eastmont on Thursday and will go on another non-league road trip to play Deer Park and Riverside on April 8.
“We’re just really focusing on one game at a time,’ Lawrence said. “One thing at a time, one at-bat at a time. We’re going to see some pretty good competition here against Eastmont, and next week we play Deer Park and Riverside which should be good competition for us.”
Royal will return to league play on April 11 against Zillah.
“Just continuing to make improvements, even in the games where we’re scoring a lot of runs,” Lawrence said. “Making those adjustments and not getting too comfortable that we’ve scored a lot of runs. We’re going to face some competition where that’s not going to come as easy.”
Ian Bivona may be reached at ibivona@columbiabasinherald.com.
