Comets complete series sweep of Go-Hawks

By John Burbridge
sports@charlescitypress.com
WAVERLY — Former Cy Young Award recipient and current Chicago White Sox color commentator Steve Stone has said, “Safety-first baseball will land you safely into fourth place.”

The Charles City Comets are “safely” in second place amid the Northeast Iowa Conference softball standings behind undefeated Crestwood. And it’s not because they don’t take chances.

While nursing a 4-1 lead against Waverly-Shell Rock in the bottom of the fourth of Tuesday’s NEIC game, Comet third baseman Allie Cross fielded a sacrifice bunt attempt from Marley Hagarty trying to advance Kasey Fox to second base.

Now every sabermetric geek this side of Billy Beane would advise “Just take the easy, given out.” But Cross threw across the diamond to nip Fox at second with shortstop Kiki Connell fielding the short-hop throw.

Had the Comets failed to get the lead runner, it could have led to a big inning for the Go-Hawks as they would have had two runners on with no outs. But the gutsy play snuffed out any building momentum as Charles City went on to sweep the season series in a 5-1 final.

The win improved the Comets’ overall record to 9-2 and NEIC record to 7-2.

The Go-Hawks scored their lone run in the first inning before Comet starter Dani Reetz shut the door with six-straight zeros for the complete-game win while improving her record to 7-1.

Connell, Lydia Staudt and Alex Litterer each had two hits for Charles City.

Connell, Cross, Ashlyn Hoeft and Sadie Gebel were all credited with RBIs.

The Comets will host Waukon on Tuesday — they previously defeated the Indians on the road 14-7.