| A close play at the plate during the Carbon-Emery softball contest last week in Castle Dale. |
As Juan Diego continues to pull away from the Region 8 pack, second place is the prize being sought after by the rest of the teams. Carbon owns the rights to the number two spot right now and was hoping to get some breathing room with a pair of wins against Emery. But leave it to the Spartans to not let the Dinos roll over them. They managed a split to keep pace with the Dinos as they enter into the final few games of regular season. The Dinos took game one 9-2 and Emery captured game two by the score of 8-6.
After a one-half hour delay while the ump crew crawled their way past a wreck in the canyon, Kyle Asay took the mound for the Dinos. In the first few innings, he held the Spartans scoreless. Each inning though he found himself in trouble after registering two quick outs. And each time he battled his way back out without letting Emery score.
The Dinos couldn’t drive one across until the fourth and then they added two in the fifth. Holding on to a tenuous lead, Asay kept the Spartans off the board until the sixth when they finally put one run to cut the lead down to two.
It was the sixth when the Dinos took charge of the game. With the bottom of the lineup leading the charge and the Emery pitcher granting some walks, Carbon exploded with six runs. Brett Johnson came on to finish off the Spartans who added one run to their total in the loss. Jordan Moynier had a pair of hits including a double. Ron Herrera also had a pair of hits that included a triple.
Emery jumped out on top in the second game of the afternoon with two in the first. Jordan Moynier was the starting pitcher for the Dinos. Carbon did not score until the second inning when they closed the gap to 2-1. Each team traded scores in the third to keep the game close. A usually strong Moynier ran out of gas in the fourth and combined with a couple of mistakes by the defense, the Spartans racked up four runs before the inning was over.
The Dinos answer with two in the fourth and then another in the sixth to pull back within two. Each team put one across in the seventh. Carbon had the tying run on base but fell short of moving the runs across and went down to defeat.
Carbon is now at 6-3 with Emery in third at 4-4. The Dinos will play host to ALA Thursday at 3:30 p.m. They beat them earlier this season by the score of 14-2. On Friday they resume region play with a game at North Sanpete. They wrap up regular season against Delta on the road.