Things were looking good for the Foothill Tech softball team on Thursday, April 19. In their home game against Santa Paula, they “had no errors,” according to Jamie Dietz ‘19, which “really made a difference.” Their pitching was solid and their infield was capitalizing. Combined with a run scored by Jessica Mendoza ‘18 in the fourth inning, the Dragons had a 1-0 lead.

Unfortunately, an overaggressive “misplay of the ball” in the top of the sixth inning put the Dragons down by two, earning “the momentum to change the game,” as Mendoza put it. She added that “they had one clutch [hit] to allow them to take the lead and we couldn’t take the lead back.”

Despite a 3-1 loss, Dietz feels that the team “played the best defense that we have played all year,” and that “our pitchers are doing amazing as well as our infield because we are making plays that save runs.”

Both Dietz and Mendoza think the team mainly needs to improve on timely hitting because “we leave base runners on bases at least every inning,” as Mendoza put it.

“We just need clutch hits to get the momentum on our side,” she said.

The softball season has been defined by games like this: where the team played well, but a few errors led to an overall loss. Moving forward, Mendoza feels a “need to change the spirit of our team.”

Dietz believes that “this game showed us that we are capable of beating these teams if we execute our hits and play defense like we did yesterday.”

Mendoza summed up her goals for improvement with one sentence: “We can’t win if we don’t score.”