Park girls’ softball battled Waconia for the second time this season May 4. Despite their 17-7 loss back in April, they ended up with a closer game of 7-1. With this improvement, the team feels confident that they’ll continue learning and growing with each game.

Varsity coach Chris Gabler said even though this game didn’t have the most desirable outcome, it still helped the team improve.

“It’s just another step, we’re getting better every game,” Gabler said. “We were better today than we were Tuesday and we’ll be better tomorrow. That’s what we want to do, just step up.”

Sophomore Cora Zumbrunnen said the team’s defense specifically has been improving.

“We did a lot better defensively than we have been doing,” Zumbrunnen said. “We’re getting better with every game, so hopefully we can pull together some wins.”

Sophomore Eva Taybior said she felt better about this Waconia game than the last meeting.

“When we played Waconia before we got run-ruled in the fifth inning, but this game we played all seven innings,” Taybior said. “It was overall a closer and more competitive game, which I’m really proud of.”

Zumbrunnen said the next step for the team is to improve their chances at the plate.

“We need to work on our batting the most, that’s our biggest issue right now,” Zumbrunnen said. “We leave too many runners on base and we aren’t getting enough hits when we should be.”

Gabler said it’s all about the team’s mindset when competing with other challenging teams. 

“We just need a little better focus,” Gabler said. “It’s all in belief. Physically, they’re good enough to play with these teams but now they have to believe that they can play with these teams. That’s where our biggest improvement is going to come from.”

Girls’ softball plays next against Benilde St. Margaret’s at 5:00 p.m. on May 10 at Aquila Park.