The Dixie Darlings put up a valiant effort Friday night in round one of the District Tournament in Greenville. The Darlings put up runs early and held Dothan to a few runs during the first few innings but came up a short falling 15-4 to Dothan.

Dothan and Troy met a few weeks ago in the Troy warm up tournament. The end result was decidedly in Dothan’s favor. Troy put up a better effort in the first-round match up except for one inning.

“In the fifth inning we just threw the ball away,” said head coach Shane Griffin. “The rest of the game we played good solid defense but let it get away in the fifth.”

The fielding for the most part was sound for the Darlings; it was throwing to the bases that seemed to plague the team from Troy.

“We had some bad throw going over the first base bag,” Griffin said. “It kind of cost us tonight. We also made some poor decisions, not getting balls back to the pitchers mound. Overall the defense was good, we just made a few mistakes here and there.

Dothan started quick in the ball game scoring four runs in the first frame. The Darlings wasted no time scoring in the bottom half of the inning, cutting Dothan’s lead in half.

Mary Haden West, Madison Allen, Alyssa sellers and Paitin Riley all got hits in the first inning to cut Dothan’s lead to 4-2. Riley had the big hit in the inning, which drove in the two runs.

Over the next three innings the Darlings held Dothan to just a few runs. Unfortunately for the Darlings, their offense couldn’t capitalize enough to make Dothan regret the lack of runs.

Overall the Darlings hit the ball well throughout the gam, to keep pace with Dothan.

“We hit the ball pretty good. Our problem tonight was we weren’t consistent,” Griffin said. “We got hits here and there, but we didn’t get the hits in bunches like we have. That would have helped if we did.”

Walker, Allen, Sellers, Riley, Abigail Barron and Jaci Rushing were among the hitters for the Darlings that had a good night at the plate

After both teams got familiar with each other in the warm up tournament in Troy, Griffin wanted his team to turn the page and compete with Dothan.

“We were really competitive tonight,” Griffin said. “Tonight was also a lot better defensive game as well. We played them a whole lot tougher than we did that day. We were in the game tonight up until the last few innings when we kind of threw the ball away. From that point the game got out of control.”

The Darlings will have to turn around quickly and play Saturday morning. One more loss for the Darlings will knock them out of the tournament.

“We have to hit the ball more consistently. I think our defense will be all right,” Griffin said.

“As long as we hit and play defense we will be fine.

The Darlings will once again play in Greenville Saturday morning at 10:15 a.m.