Lady Marauders softball even at McKinney, looking for pre-district challenges

By John English

With a 3-3 showing in the McKinney Tournament this weekend, coach Christy Tumilty said the Marcus softball team is showing some good signs, but still needs to find some more consistency.

Marcus will square off with Richland at 6 p.m. on Tuesday at Richland High School, and Tumilty said she anticipates a good challenge.

“We haven't faced Richland in a few years, but typically, they have a good program,” Tumilty said. “Hopefully, it will be a good challenge for us. At this point in the season, we are just looking for good games that will prepare us for district.”

Tumilty said the McKinney tournament was a good experience for her team and said, for the most part, she was pretty pleased with the effort.

“We finished stronger than we started, so that was a positive,” Tumilty said. “We're still working hard to get all of the kids to work together, and we have a lot of the early season issues to work out.

“I felt like we did a lot of things right and improved in a lot of areas, so it was overall a good tournament.”

Tumilty has always liked to challenge her team with strong competition in the non-district schedule, and the Marcus coach said this year is no exception, and her players are responding well.

“Even though we've gotten a lot of the same kids coming back, it's still just getting them out there and getting them used to playing with each other again,” Tumilty said. “That's been kind of our issue early on, but this weekend was a lot better.

“I think the kids are on board with us and they understand what we are trying to get them to do and they are determined and working hard to get there, too.”

A highlight for the Marauders in the McKinney Tournament came in the game against Forney, when Heather Foust pitched a no-hitter in a 2-0 victory for Marcus.