Park’s batters rapped out 11 hits and eight runs in a back-and-forth 8-4 girls softball win over visiting Woodbury Thursday.

The Wolfpack went up 2-0 after the first inning and led 3-1 after two innings, but the Royals scored four runs in the third to gain the lead briefly. After that it was all Park.

Park tied the game in the fourth then added a big three-run fifth inning and added another run for insurance in the sixth to take the victory.

Park’s fifth inning scoring splurge was marked by a leadoff single from Emma Ambroz followed by back-to-back sacrifices by Grace Conaway and Skylar Crocker and then three straight singles that broke the game open.

“We did a great job, a lot of energy,” said Park head coach Bob Loshek. “We jumped out with the lead, we came up right away and scored runs the first inning which is always what you want to do in a game if you can. We have to keep working on defense. We missed a couple balls again and we gave the lead away. What I was proud of was that we got back after it, regained the lead and didn’t look back. We kept adding to the lead after that. And that was good.

“Grace threw well,” Loshek added. “I don’t think Grace really got hit, we just didn’t field the ball for her. And then Grace still kept her composure and kept us in the game the whole time. SO we did a good job of taking the lead, giving the lead away and then battling right back to get the lead.”

Park starter Gracie Bond scattered nine hits, while walking two and striking out seven in the win.

“I think I did a really good job of locating my fastballs and going in and out,” said Bond. “And my changeup worked really well. It produced a lot of mis-hits.

“I think we did a really good job of flushing the third or fourth inning, whenever they scored their four runs, flushing and bouncing back. We didn’t let a run in after that. We were like leave it in the past and move on. And we did a great job of keeping our pedal to the metal and scoring runs.”

Park has a trio of important road games this week, playing Cretin-Derham Hall (1-4, 1-5) at University of Northwestern – St. Paul on Wednesday, then playing at conference leading Stillwater (4-0, 4-0) Thursday and at Woodbury (2-2, 2-2) Friday.

Grace Conaway of the Wolfpack is all smiles as she gets a fist bump from head coach Bob Loshek as she comes into third after a hit advanced two in Park’s 8-4 win over Woodbury. Photo by John Molene.