Red Demons crush Titans in home-opener
By Shelton Burch
Sports Editor
The Dodge City Red Demons softball team crushed the Wichita South Titans in their homeopening, Friday night doubleheader, winning the first game by a score of 15-0 in the third inning and 12-1 in the sixth.
Dodge City senior Grace Ruehle capped off the night for the Red Demons with a three-run homer to end the second game.
“Actually it was quite funny, the girls have been giving me a hard time,” Ruehle said. “They gave me a hard time right before I got up to bat. Shay(lyn) Turner looked over at me and goes ‘You know Grace, you should just hit a home run,’ and I’m like ‘You know that sounds kind of cool, well but the wind is kinda troubling that’ and Madison Armstrong looked over at me and goes ‘The wind’s not blowing out anymore you dork, just hit the ball.’” She said she started running around first base and happened to look up at one of her coaches who was waving her around the base.
“He had just had this really big smile on his face, and so that was kinda when I knew that ‘Oh man that one must not have been too bad,’” Ruehle said.
The night started off with a dominating performance in the pitching circle by freshman Raemie Lopp. After the a groundout to start the game, Lopp struck out the next seven. She finished the game with eight, allowing just two hits.
The game 
got ugly quick for the Titans. Errant throws and balls getting past the catcher allowed the Red Demons to put up 11 runs in the first inning of game one.
In the second game, junior Raegan Lopp allowed a single, walked a batter and hit a batter before striking out the final two batters of the inning.
She ended the first inning having earned all three outs by strikeout.
Red Demons head coach Ashley Podschun said she thought the two Lopp sisters did a good job in the pitching circle Friday night.
“Raemie struggled a little bit at first with her changeup control and controlling it, it kept going high on her, but after the first couple innings she settled down,” Podschun said. “Real nice at that pitch. Everything else on her part was working great, so it was just a matter of hitting her spots and basically letting our play their spot whenever they got in play, but there wasn’t a whole lot of balls in play today so I thought they did a great job.”
Reagan also had her struggles at times early while pitching the second game.
She went to the coach and said she needed to work some more, so she got in some extra pitches while the Red Demons batted in the bottom of the first.
“When she came back out the second time she did phenomenal, so I’m very proud of both those girls,” Podschun said.
The Red Demons are next
in action Tuesday when they head to Eisenhower for a triangular against Eisenhower and Great Bend.
Dodge City advanced to 4-0 overall this season with the wins.
“Super proud of the girls, they’ve been working hard,” Podschun said. “(I) told ‘em tonight ‘Don’t settle.’ We got tough ones on Tuesday and they know it. We’re gonna see completely different teams from what we’ve seen. We’re gonna see a lot of speed on the pitching mound, we’re gonna see a lot more slappers in the boxes, and then defensively we’re gonna see two defenses that are gonna be very solid with great arms.”
