The Turlock High softball team is off to the program’s best start in over a decade after the Bulldogs defeated Buhach Colony 7-4 on Thursday afternoon.
“Even our losses early on were really tough teams and we battled, we are just playing solid now and were able to come out with the win and we are happy about that,” said Turlock head coach Jill Ogden about her team that improves to 7-3.
Since 2005, Turlock has never won more than six games of their first 10 until Thursday when they captured their seventh victory of the year and the first league win in the Central California Conference.
“Our offense just gets going and we were scoring runs with two outs and good things happened. We are just trying to put the ball in play,” said Ogden.
Turlock has also now won six of its last seven games coming off a strong performance in the Waterford Tournament just a week ago. In that tournament, Turlock finished with a 3-1 record and their only loss was by one run and came at the hands of Los Banos in a 4-3 final.
The Bulldogs were looking to pick up where they left off against BC, but it wasn’t the smoothest game on Thursday.
Turlock committed seven errors for the game, while not allowing a single earned run.
“We had seven errors today, those are four unearned runs and Shelby, our pitcher, held her composure and got us out of some jams. And the bat has been really solid for the team,” said Ogden. “Just top to bottom the lineup is solid, they never quit on offense and it’s a real strength for us.”
Offensively, it looked like Turlock was nearly untouchable—especially with two strikes.
The Bulldogs scored six of their seven runs on two out rallies.
In the fourth inning, trailing 2-1, a Turlock five-run rally was highlighted by Frutoz after she blasted a three-run double that hit off the right center field wall.
“Shelby’s (Frutoz) pitching has been a workhorse for us, she pitches really well and never loses her composure,” said Ogden.
She never did even after some late errors led to base runners in the seventh inning that saw the possible game-tying run at home plate.
Frutoz was able to get the final out after Sophie Mayol made the play to secure the win.
“We kind of take the preseason as preseason, but now we we’re looking at league and its cliché but we said one game at a time and controlling the game in front of us,” said Ogden. “The next one, we are ready for that game, we are not trying to get ahead of ourselves, we are going to play league and see where we are or are not in the end.”
Frutoz also started on the mound and tossed a complete game while allowing just five hits, no earned runs and striking out nine.
Jessie Miranda was 2-for-4 with two runs scored and an RBI and a stolen base. Frutoz was 1-for-4 with four RBI and a double.
Turlock's next game will be on the road at Atwater at 4 p.m. Tuesday.
