While in the circle, Maddison Kellogg normally pitches to contact.
It’s mostly led to a lot of pop flies around the diamond, some more adventurous than others. Throw in the wind factor and Kellogg couldn’t catch many breaks.
Kellogg got mixed results Tuesday, as she yielded seven runs, three of which were unearned in a 7-0 Pacific League loss against visiting Crescenta Valley at McCambridge Park.
“I produce a lot of popups and line drives,” said Kellogg, a freshman right-hander who went 5 2/3 innings. “There were some balls hit in the air that gave us some trouble. It just didn’t go our way and we’ll learn from our mistakes. We have to just brush it off and we can’t get discouraged.”
Burbank (11-12 overall, 4-4 in league) fell to Crescenta Valley (15-8, 7-1) for the second time this season.
The Bulldogs suffered a 2-1 road loss to the Falcons on March 10. The teams will meet for the third and final time April 21 at Crescenta Valley.
Crescenta Valley got things started in the first inning. With two outs, Isabella Jamgotchian hit a high fly ball to the right fielder, who dropped the ball while battling the wind.
Two batters later, Lauren Curtis had a run-scoring single to make it 1-0.
The Bulldogs’ best scoring opportunity came in the fourth inning, trailing 1-0.
Samantha Buckley doubled with one out and reached third base on a two-out single by Kara Valencia, who finished with a team-high two hits. However, Crescenta Valley starting pitcher Perri Deriah got Sasha Quintanar to pop up to shortstop to end the threat.
“We had a good chance that inning to score, “ said Burbank coach Melissa Sanchez, whose team had five hits. “We just couldn’t execute that time.
“My team knows how good they are. We play everybody hard. It’s just about them believing they can get over those little humps so we’re in the position to win games. Maddison always keeps us in the game and she pitched well today.”
Crescenta Valley extended its lead to 2-0 in the fifth on a line drive by Lily Hinkle that was dropped by the left fielder with two outs.
The Falcons made it 3-0 with another unearned run following a sacrifice fly by Haley Krohn in the sixth.
Crescenta Valley scored four runs in the seventh, capped by a two-run single by Krohn to complete the scoring.
“Our last couple of games have been hard,” Buckley said. “We just have to try to turn things around.”
Burbank will next host Arcadia on Thursday.
