GREAT FALLS — Kalispell Glacier and Great Falls High each came out victorious in their afternoon matchups on Tuesday. The Wolfpack cruised by Great Falls CMR 11-3, and the Bison held on for a narrow 9-8 win against Kalispell Flathead.
Glacier 11, CMR 3
Glacier did its heavy lifting in the second inning, scoring four runs and taking a lead that it would not lose for the remainder of the game.
The Wolfpack trailed 1-0 in the second and faced two outs with a runner on third. Zoey Allen stepped to the plate and hit a two-run home run to left-center field. Two at-bats later saw Nakiah Persinger drive in one more run from second as she hit one towards the outfield for a standing double.
Cazz Rankosky allowed Persinger to cross home plate after she came up with an RBI single to put the Wolfpack ahead 4-1.
The Rustlers' Hailey Marr found herself on third base after making contact to right field which led to a fielding error on Glacier’s behalf. Julia Bushard followed up with an RBI single to make it 4-2. CMR scored once more before the end of the second to make it a one-run game.
The bats never cooled off for Glacier, though. Working with a 5-3 lead in the fifth, the defending Class AA state champs hit another two-run home run. They would proceed to score two more runs in the final two innings on the way to the victory.
Great Falls 9, Flathead 8
The Bison scored two runs in both the first and second innings, taking a 4-0 lead into the third. However, that is when Flathead found its luck at the plate as they put up six runs to take the lead.
Great Falls responded with two more runs of its own to make it knotted at 6-6 after three innings.
In the fourth, the Bison’s Kinslee Reeves was just short of a solo home run. Her ball bounced deep in center field and over the fence for a ground-rule double. She eventually crossed home on a sacrifice fly to put the Bison in front 7-6.
Flathead responded in the fifth as Mackenzie Brandt hit a ball down the third baseline for a RBI single.
Ava Newmack gave Great Falls a 9-7 lead in the fifth with a two-run homer center. With the same score in the top of the seventh, Brandt went deep to left-center for a solo-shot to bring with Braves within one run.
Flathead had the tying run at second and the go-ahead run at first, but a hit directly back to Ashley Boland led to an easy final out as the Bison escaped with the win.
