After winning their district championship last month, Belles head coach Scott Reeder immediately got to work on the team’s offense. Now just two days away from the state tournament, Reeder is making sure his team remains focused on the ultimate goal.

After deciding to play in the district tournament instead of advancing straight to state, Troy scored over 80 runs and had over 60 hits.

Despite the success offensively, Reeder and the Belles have still focused on offense over the course of the last couple of weeks.

“We learned out team was very solid at hitting the ball,” Reeder said. “We still have zeroed in on offense and hitting the ball.”
Troy featured a pitching staff that featured five different arms in the district tournament. Even with the uptick in the competition level, Reeder believes he once again can reach at least five if not seven deep this time around.

“We weren’t sure of what all we had,” Reeder said. “We were able to pitch five different girls and they all performed excellent. That let us know what we had pitching-wise. We will do the same thing. I feel confident that I can put anybody in there at any time. We have about seven that can pitch and we will more than likely throw about six pitchers in that tournament.”

Troy will be joined by East Montgomery, Underwood and UAM in the tournament, three teams they are not very familiar with.

“We don’t really know any of these teams,” Reeder said. “Two of them we played last year in state and we beat them, but I don’t know anything about those teams this year. New girls, new coaches – so we are going into the unknown.”

Troy will take the four-and-a-half hour trip north to Underwood beginning on Friday. For Reeder and his players, the goal is to remain focused.

“Staying focused is going to be the key,” Reeder said. “Saturday will be the only day we play two games. After Saturday, the tournament will go down to one game a day and It’s going to take keeping the girls focused on the task at hand.”

Troy will open up the tournament against East Montgomery beginning at 10 a.m. on Field three.