Sadness was felt at the Glendale Sports Complex on April 1, and no, it wasn’t an April Fool’s hoax. The Lady Vaqueros softball team lost to Citrus College with a final score of 5-2 in the first game and a score of 9-2 in the second of a doubleheader.

Citrus played a tough first game, never backing down. They took home the first run of the game in the first inning. The Lady Vaqs struggled in the early innings to keep up, but towards the last innings of the game you could see the drive in Lady Vaqs’ faces. It was time to fight back. The fight was just not enough to keep up with Citrus.

Lady Vaquero pitcher, sophomore Kelly Koros pitched one heck of a game; it was strike out after strike out. It just was not enough, Coach Dave Wilder said, “we have a great pitcher, we just couldn’t back her up.” Wilder adds, “[when] the pitcher [Koros] starts to get frustrated…that’s not good.”

Wilder said that the team “doesn’t hit at the right time.” When Citrus was up to bat you could see it in their players faces that it was their intention to knock that ball out of the felid. When the Lady Vaqs were up to bat, they were constantly swinging at balls either to high or to low, and not connecting with ball when that perfect pitch would be thrown. However, freshman right fielder Angela Pizzo had a great double, bringing in two of her teammates home.

Yet when it came to stealing bases, the Lady Vaqs knew exactly what to do. Sophomore second baseman, Diana Garcia in the top of the seventh inning stole second and third base. Debbie Martin, a freshman center fielder, stole second base, also in the top of the seventh inning.

Wilder said, “we have a young team.” This year’s team consists of four sophomores and eight freshmen. Practice makes perfect, maybe what these girls need is a little more experience to bring home consistent wins.

Upcoming games for the team include Thursday’s home game against College of the Canyons, at 2:30 p.m., then the April 17 home game against Bakersfield College, at 2:30 p.m.