Gallup softball ‘ahead of schedule’

RIO RANCHO, N.M.

Admittedly, Ray Spencer didn’t see this coming.

With a bevy of young talent, the Gallup softball coach was expecting his team to be contenders two, three years down the road.

But with a 10-3 mark heading into April, the Lady Bengals are no longer flying under the radar.

“We’re ahead of schedule,” Spencer said. “I wasn’t planning on us to play this well this season. I was predicting to see us this next year or the following year.”

With the exception of the Apollo Cool Nites Tournament in Glendale, Arizona, earlier this month, Spencer said they have the same schedule as last year but he’s seeing a big difference.

“We’re run-ruling some of those teams,” he said.

Over the weekend Gallup finished 11th overall at the 26-team Kristin Griego softball tournament in Rio Rancho. The Lady Bengals finished with a 3-2 record, including a 5-2 win over Bloomfield in their final game of the tournament last Saturday.

“This was a good win for us, especially against a team within our district,” Spencer said.

Gallup opened the tournament with a 7-3 win over Los Alamos and in the next round they were sent to the silver bracket, losing to tournament runner-up Cleveland High School 5-4 on a walk-off homer.

Spencer said they struggled on offense to start the game and defensively they had five errors that cost them three runs.

“Other than that I thought we played good defense,” he said.

At the plate, Spencer said they were trying to adjust to Cleveland’s pitcher and in the last couple of innings they made some timely hits to tie the game.

“The girls were pumped and in the last two innings we shut them down,” Spencer said. “(Cleveland) had last at-bat and they had a solo home run. They won the game but all in all I was pleased with their performance.”

---