Late-game rally clinches NRHEG comeback win over Medford

Medford - Through six innings, the Medford High School softball team looked to be a mere three outs away from extending the school’s single-season wins record to seven.
The NRHEG Panthers on the other hand, who won a close decision over Maple River on Tuesday, were challenged by their head coach Wendy Schultz.
“Are you going to roll over and die or are we going to get to it and hit like we can?” she said.
Challenge accepted.
Cranking out nine hits, NRHEG (5-9, 4-6 Gopher) exploded for eight runs in the top of the seventh inning to topple the Tigers 10-5 Thursday at Medford Public School.  
Qoute
Prior to the seventh inning rally, the Panthers didn’t seem to have any answers for Medford’s Mack Paulson, being held hitless in the first two innings. The Tigers however, managed to strike first and often. With runners on second and third, catcher Kori Dodge hit a hard ground ball to Grace Johns to plate Kily Nihart.
After making quick work of the Panthers in the top of the second inning, Emma Kniefel connected with a long drive to left field, scoring Journey Anderst and Madison Klein to extend the lead to 3-0. Despite only recording five hits, Medford managed to have eight batters reach safely through two innings but stranded four. For the game, they left 11 on base. However, Tigers head coach Alyssa Strunk noted that there could have been more.
“We left too many runners on base,” she added. “We have to take that and learn from it.”
NRHEG managed to cut the deficit to 3-2 the following inning after a two-out, late-inning rally. Grace Johns hammered a RBI double to deep centerfield to score Rachel Collins. Just one batter later, Gabby Muri delivered a RBI single to score Johns. Kayley Camerer’s weak flyball to shallow leftfield would end the inning.
Medford extended the lead to 5-2 after Lily Roehrick crossed in the fifth and Dodge delivered a RBI single to score Nihart in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Then Panthers’ bat heated up.
After a pair of singles by Chloie Ardnt and Collins, Johns smashed her third RBI of the game with a laser to left field. NRHEG would bat through the entire lineup while cranking out those nine critical hits. In fact, 12 batters would step into the box for the Panthers. What kept the inning going however was a pair of errors by the Tigers, both of which allowed runs to cross the plate. Strunk noted that it’s one of the rigors of having a young team. Paulson would allow 10 hits on 13 runs in seven innings of work.
“There still learning how to finish, how to get over the difficult parts of the game,” she added. “Everything was going right up until that seventh inning, and then we make a mistake and kind of fell apart from there.”
After having a rough go for much of the contest, Panthers’ pitcher Natalie Aaseth would have her shortest outing of the game in the seventh inning, recording three-straight outs to seal the comeback. In seven innings of work, she allowed five runs on nine hits.