W.F. West had one of its toughest tests of the season coming out of the spring break on Monday, as the Bearcats faced off against Aberdeen’s Lilly Camp.
It was their first time facing Camp since last year’s district title game, when they were able to score two runs and hold on for the win.
Camp, a Grand Canyon University commit, seemed to be on a different level on Monday, though, as she struck out 18 Bearcats and shut out W.F. West in Aberdeen’s 5-0 victory.
All W.F. West coach Kevin Zylstra could do was tip his cap.
“Camp was just on,” Zylstra said. “Holy smokes. I told the girls ‘That’s what it’s like to play D1 softball right there.’”
Zylstra said that in the week leading up to the game, they cranked the machines up to 67 miles per hour in the cages, a number Camp hit consistently throughout her complete-game performance.
“It’s a little different coming out of a machine versus coming out of a human being.” Zylstra said. “It’s really tough.”
The only ball that the Bearcats put in play in the first three innings was a bunt attempt, and they didn’t get a hit until Gracie Elam legged out an infield single in the sixth. The furthest ball off a Bearcat bat was a sharp lineout to second in the bottom of the seventh.
“We could have gone more short ball,” Zylstra said. “But their defense is taking that away.”
Aberdeen took the lead in the first and slowly added on through, tacking on one run in both the fourth and fifth before plating two in the seventh.
All five runs came against Taylor Tobin, who was only charged with four earned runs and was still able to strike out eight Bobcats in seven innings.
“She’ll be the first to tell you she was struggling with her location today,” Zylstra said. “She had a lot of flat rise balls and things like that that they hit. She gets that cleaned up, she can be as tough as anybody.”
The loss drops W.F. West to 4-4 overall and 1-2 in EvCo play, leaving them tied for fourth in the EvCo standings with Black Hills.
The Bearcats will make the trip north to face the Wolves on Wednesday, and then they’ll go back up again on Friday to face Sacramento State commit Ella Ferguson and the Tumwater Thunderbirds.
“This league this year, there’s gonna be teams knocking each other off,” Zylstra said. “If somebody comes through unscathed, it’s gonna be a miracle. Two losses is not where we want to be, but it is what it is, and we just gotta move forward.”
