It was a battle for first place followed by a battle for last Wednesday night in the Government and Industrial Coed Slowpitch Softball League.
In the first of three games played, Senate topped Ritz Carlton 13-3 in the battle of cellar dwellers. Then Innovative Communications Corp. edged Radio One/AT&T 13-10, securing first place in the Farrington division. And finally, Postal beat Apex 12-3 in the nightcap.
Senate jumped out to a 8-0 lead by scoring four runs in each of the first two innings. They looked like the Senate of old when they won the league in 1996. Ritz scored two runs in the fourth to close the gap to 8-2. But Senate answered with five runs in the top of the fifth. Ritz could only muster one run in the bottom of the inning but it wasn’t enough.
Kacy Hendricks and Greg Smith were perfect at the plate in three and two appearances respectively for Senate. Dan Dutton was also perfect at the plate in two appearances.
Cecil Farrell picked up the victory for Senate. Senate improves to 1-9. Liz Watley picked up the loss for Ritz, which dropped 0-9.
The game was called due to the ten-run mercy rule and determined the seeds for the single-elimination tournament entitled "the best of the rest." Senate wins the tenth seed. Ritz gets the eleventh seed.
The second game was the thriller of the evening. Close to 100 Innovative Communication Corp. co-workers wearing lime green shirts were in the stands cheering on their team. Radio One/AT&T also had their own fans with blow horns and AT&T number one signs to rooting for them.
ICC scored five runs in the top of the first inning. They were aided by three costly Radio One errors. Radio One answered with four runs in the bottom of inning. All of their runs came in on Sheldon Turnbull's grand slam home run.
Radio One gained the lead adding three runs in the bottom of the second inning. ICC picked up one in the third and two in the fourth to recapture the lead, 8-7. ICC's pitcher Henry Richards kept Radio One scoreless from the third to the sixth inning. His team scored five more going into the bottom of the seventh inning.
Radio One intentionally walked ICC slugger Athniel "Bobby" Thomas twice but clean-up hitter Robert Crossley followed with hits to drive in runners. Radio One tried to rally back but could only come up with three runs.
ICC jumps ahead one game in the standings with their record going to 8-1 as Radio One drops to 7-2.
In the final game, Postal jumped all over Apex scoring five runs in the first inning. They built their lead to 12-0 after four innings. However, Postal allowed Apex three runs in the top of the fifth inning to prolong the inevitable. Postal had balanced hitting as five batters got two hits each. Juan Rivera picked up the victory.
