The Manhattan High softball team opened their season against Lawrence on Friday, winning their first game 12-2 and the second game 14-0. Going into this season the team had the advantage of only losing one senior last year, so the majority of the team has already had one year together. This helped them feel more confident going into this season. 

“Going into the game I think all of us felt really confident, we’ve already had a year of playing experience,” junior Takara Kolterman said. “We only lost one senior, so our team dynamic is strong and connected because we have been together for a year, so that is definitely an advantage we have over other teams.” 

Heading into the first game the overall feeling among the team was confidence. Everyone came out strong and played well together as a team.

“In practice we were worried that we weren’t going to be that strong, but we got out there and we were all having a good time,” senior Logan Neitzel said. “I don’t think there was a single person who didn’t want to be there or was upset, everyone had a great attitude.”

The hope for the team this season is to pick up right where they left off last year, and they are on the road to doing so.

“We’re pretty confident [and] we are very hopeful that we will pick up where we left off last season, and build upon that,” head coach Connie Miller said. “I was pretty happy with every aspect of it, we hit well, defense was good and solid, our pitchers did well, it was just a good all around opportunity to get a couple games under our belt.”

Even though the season started with a win, the team will continue to improve upon their skills and techniques to help continue to win, and hopefully make it all the way to State this year. 

“We’re always working to improve on all aspects, you can’t win ball games without scoring runs, so hitting is always my focal point, we spend a lot of time in practice working on hitting and techniques,” Miller said. “We want to work on finishing games, making sure that when we have a lead we protect it, and we do all of those basic and mechanical sound things to make sure that happens, and focusing on the moment. We want to put ourselves in the best possible position for the off season.” 

After competing in Great Bend Tuesday, the team will have their home opener on Friday. 

“Tuesday we go to Great Bend to play two different teams out there, our expectation is to go out and win both of those games, we’ve played them before and we’ve beaten them before, so we expect to do that again,” Miller said. “Next Friday is our first home game, against Seaman, they are always a good team to play, it will be our first real challenge. We want to play to the best of our ability and take one or two games from them next Friday.”