Centreville Claws its Way by Chantilly in Varsity Softball

Chantilly's late inning rally fell a bit short Tuesday night as the Lady Chargers dropped a Concorde district contest to Centreville by the score of 4-2 in Chantilly.  Though they were out hit by the home squad 6-3, the Lady Wildcats' offense took advantage of hits at key moments while the defense capitalized on a few mental mistakes by the Lady Chargers on the base paths.  Not to be overlooked was the pitching performance of Emily Gembarowicz, who recorded 12 strikeouts for the second consecutive game while only allowing 3 hits.

The first three innings of the game could best be described as a pitchers' duel.  Neither pitcher allowed a hit and Emily had fired 8 strikeouts out of the first 9 outs up to that point.  In the fourth inning, Centreville scored two runs on a couple of hits mixed with aggressive base running.  They scored another two runs in the fifth inning to take a 4-0 lead.  The Lady Chargers' bats awoke in the sixth inning with 5 consecutive hits from the first 5 batters.  Wendy Sloan and Aimee Knecht started off the inning with consecutive singles and Tori Doherty followed with a double to right to make it a 4-2 ballgame.  Laura Conaghan and Bryanna Kerbuski followed with consecutive singles, but Centreville was able to turn an inning-ending double play a few batters later to preserve their victory.

With a record of 5-6 overall (1-2 in the district), the Lady Chargers will look to get back to .500 in district play Friday night as they face the Westfield Bulldogs at 6:30 pm in Chantilly.