Borders, Knights zone in on Rams

Grayslake Central's fourth inning proved long for Grayslake North pitcher Carly Borders, who was piling up strikeouts until suddenly missing the plate.

"I was worn out," Borders said. "It's been a long week."

A long week?

The senior lefty was speaking Tuesday, mind you, after she and her teammates rallied for a 6-3 win over their crosstown rival.

When Borders realized what day of the week it was, she smiled sheepishly about her comment.

Completely understandable, Carly.

It's hit that time of the spring softball season when teams are playing essentially every day and sometimes more than that, weather permitting. It's hard to keep track of what day it is.

It turned out to be a good one after all for Borders, who led a 9-hit attack by going 3-for-3 with an RBI double, as North improved to 5-8 overall and 1-2 in the Fox Valley Fox Division. Borders admittedly had been struggling at the plate.

She said a conversation with assistant coach Tim Hough and a trip to the batting cages with her dad after Monday's 6-1 loss to Prairie Ridge helped get her left-handed hitting stroke on track.

Borders credited freshman teammate Kristi Gandy for helping give the Knights a boost against Central (4-17, 0-3). Borders had just struck out her ninth batter of the game - the Rams' second out in the fourth - when she got wild. She walked three straight batters, wild-pitching in the go-ahead run in a 1-1 tie, then allowed a run-scoring single to Tory Dohm.

Enter Gandy, who got the final out on a called-third strike, stranding two runners in scoring position.

"It was a little hard (entering in relief)," Gandy said. "But it didn't really bother me."

North then went to work offensively against Central starter Monika Wedick. Samantha Fletcher, Borders and Gandy all singled to load the bases with none out.

The Knights wound up scoring 3 runs - on RBI singles by Jessica Livengood and Brianna Leon, and a sacrifice fly by Brooke Tracy - to take a 4-3 lead.

"That was wonderful," Knights coach Molly Jones said. "We were able to string hits together, which is something that we haven't been able to do."

Mindy Runge's RBI base hit in the fifth added to North's lead, and Gandy did the rest in the circle.

She earned the win by pitching 31/3 innings of no-hit relief, striking out five and not walking a batter. Gandy retired nine straight batters before the Rams' Kelly Silver (1-for-4) reached on a two-out error in the seventh.

"She's got a great changeup," Jones said of Gandy. "And even though she's a freshman, she's got a lot of experience. She's got really, really good stamina."

Borders and Gandy combined on a 3-hitter with 14 strikeouts. Along with Samantha Myers, they give the Knights three quality pitchers.

"It's a really good rotation," said Gandy, who also went 2-for-3 at the plate. "It's good for the team."

"It's nice to get a day off (from pitching)," Borders said.

Central's Abbie Goetsch - who hit her seventh homer of the season Monday - had an RBI single in the first to give the Rams the lead.

"To be able to get ahead early in the game is exciting for us because that means we're actually hitting the ball early in the game," Central coach Abbey Tadelman said. "One of the things that we've been working on is trying to be more aggressive at the beginning of the game and not waiting until we've seen the pitcher once."