On Saturday, April 18, the Lady Vikings and the Lady Wolverines went chin to chin in a battle for supremacy on the softball field, and the Lady Vikings dominated not once, but twice against the defending league champions, the Friday Harbor Lady Wolverines, 6-1 in the first game and 11-9 in the second of the double header.

The weather was fine and the concentration from both teams was high, but in a decisive 5th inning, the Lady Wolverines made some errors in the field and with the bases loaded, the Lady Vikings sent clay flying as they brought three batters in across home plate.

Lady Vikings pitcher Adria Garcia commented after the first game against the Lady Wolverines, “It was easy to stay focused. Sometimes it’s not, but today it was. We were all talking and keeping the chatter up and it felt really good.”

The second game opened with Friday Harbor setting the tone quickly with two runs. In the second inning Orcas scored two runs, then the Lady Wolverines retorted with six runs of their own. Then Orcas, not to be thwarted, sent six of their batters again across the plate six times. The game was then tied in the third inning at 8-8. Orcas kept their head in the game and continued to score, following up with three more runs to only one more run hit in by the Lady Wolverines.

“The biggest point of this particular game is that our players came back from a point deficit; it’s a real sign of maturity to come back from that many runs against us,” Coach Scott Harris said. “Playing at this caliber with this level of focus marks them as a special group of real team players.”

The Lady Vikings also played against Forest Ridge, a 1A school from Bellevue and beat them 12-2, in 6 innings, earlier in the week.

“Forest Ridge has an average softball program, but they have a strong pitcher,” Harris said. “And a highlight of that game was that our pitcher, Adria Garcia, had 19 strikeouts …. and 0 walks. It was a great game for Garcia. It’s very exciting to see your pitcher have that much success.

“We have a bunch of league games left. This puts us in the hunt for the league title in 1A/2B northwest. If we keep playing well, we could go to the tri-district playoffs. It is very exciting for our program to to beat the Lady Wolverines. It was a league game, and they are the defending league champions, so that was a big win for us.”

The next game for the Lady Vikings softball team is on Thursday, April 23 in Darrington, and the following day, Friday, the Lady Vikings play against Mt. Vernon’s high school junior varsity team at Buck Park on Orcas Island with the time to be determined.