The Awesome Blossoms produced their second shutout in as many games on the road, this time against Medford, in a 10-0 five-inning victory Thursday night in Gopher Conference softball action.

Emily Wencl produced a stellar pitching effort in her first start of the season.

Wencl allowed only two hits in five innings, striking out seven and only walking one Tiger batter.

Medford's Randi Morgan pitched all five innings and allowed seven hits, striking out four and walking five.

"Emily had a real good outing tonight," said Blooming Prairie coach Chad Gimbel. "She did a super job throwing strikes to provide strikeouts for us.

"It was a real good game by Emily for her first time on out on the mound this year."

Rachel Stenzel went 2-3 with two RBIs and one run scored.

Abbey Bergstrom tripled to score two runs, while fellow Blossom Hillary Jones doubled with one run scored and two RBIs.

Kristi Schwake went 1-2 with two runs scored, while Amber Vogt and Amanda Herdina both had a hit in the game.

"We did not hit the ball as well as we should have tonight," remarked coach Gimbel, "but I'm happy with the way our defense is improving.

Tonight is our second shutout in a row, and that really gives a boost to our team's overall confidence. Hopefully that can keep our confidence up."

Blooming Prairie (4-1, 3-0) travels to the Stewartville Tournament on Saturday, starting with Chatfield at 11 a.m. and then host Stewartville at 1 p.m.

Linescore:

BPHS 080 11--10

7

1

Medford00000--0

5

5

WP--Wencl 1-0, LP--Morgan.

Southland sweeps Houston

Southland's softball team seems to focus on its scoring game-in and game-out as a key to victory. On Thursday night, the Lady Rebels got outstanding play in every aspect of the game in a Southeast Conference sweep of Houston in Rose Creek.

Amy Walerak and Michelle Landherr combined to allow one Houston run on a total of five hits and one walk as Southland skipped to 3-1 overall and in conference play. The Rebels rapped out 17 hits in the two-game tilt.

Walerak scattered four hits, one walk and two strikeouts in the complete-game victory in the opener, a 5-1 Southland win. Miranda Schneider went 2-2 with a double and a triple. The triple drove in Nikki Kirkpatrick with the third of four Rebel runs in the second inning. Kirkpatrick's single plated Bridget Felton and Sara Walerak as the winning runs.

Landherr, an eighth-grader, allowed one hit and no walks in the 8-0 shutout in game two. Southland scored three runs in the third and five more in the fourth to complete the scoring, getting 10 hits in the win.

Megan Schroeder went 4-4 with a double, Amy Walerak was 2-4 and Shannon Halbach was 2-3. Schroeder's single in the third drove in Halbach with what proved to be the game-winning run.

Southland had five hits in a row to lead off the fourth inning -- two for extra bases -- and Landherr cruised to the victory.

"We played some tough defense too," said Southland coach Karleen Retterath. "The kids made some unbelievable plays.

"Our pitching has been doing a great job of holding people. They've all really come out and played ball."

Southland plays a non-conference game tonight at Hayfield at 4:30 p.m., and the Rebels go to intra-county and SEC rival Lyle/Pacelli on Monday for a league doubleheader.

Linescores:

Game One

Houston001000--142

Southland04010x--570

Soppa and Cox; A.Walerak and Howe. WP--Walerak (1-1). LP--Soppa.

Game Two

Southland003500--8100

Houston000000--010

M.Landherr and Schroeder; Johnson and Cox. WP--Landherr (2-0). LP--Johnson.

LOGM drops doubleheader to Rushford-Peterson

The LOGM softball team went into Trojan territory Thursday night knowing that they had very tough competition to overcome, and ended up losing both games of a doubleheader to their Southeast Conference rival by a combined score of 16-4.

LOGM lost the first matchup 9-2 in a game that lacked run-producing hits. Cassie Denisen started the game allowing four runs in four innings. Aubrey Jacobsen pitched the rest of the game in relief, allowing the remaining five R-P runs to be scored. Both pitchers' efforts led to eight hits, three strikeouts, and five base-on-balls.

Jacobsen and Krystle Boehmer contributed LOGM's run-scoring hits.

Jacobsen pitched all five innings in a 7-2 losing effort during the second game, giving up seven runs on seven hits, striking out two while walking four batters. LOGM's only runs came on solo home runs by Emily Huey and Cassie Denisen during the third inning.

"We hit the ball hard when we connected, but we need to work on keeping our errors down," said Bulldog coach Dawn Baudoin.

LOGM drops to 0-8 overall, and will host a doubleheader against Fillmore Central/Lanesboro on Monday at 4:30 p.m.

Linescores:

Game One

R-P310023--980

LOGM000002--251

Game Two

LOGM002000--2 2 1

R-P400030--770