By Ryan Atkinson

ratkinson@joplinglobe.com

MANHATTAN, Kan. — Two swings of the bat put a sour end to a rough Saturday for the Riverton Rams at the Kansas Class 3A state softball tournament.

The McLouth Bulldogs got a pair of doubles in the bottom of the eighth to send the Rams to a 1-0 loss in the third-place game at the Twin Oaks Sports Complex.

Earlier in the day, the Rams committed six errors and gave up a 2-0 lead in a 6-2 loss to the Wichita Independent Panthers in a semifinal matchup.

“It’s tough any way you lose,” Riverton coach Brian Mitchell said. “But after getting the lead in that semifinal and then just not getting any breaks … it’s tough.”

The Rams plated single runs in each of the first two innings of the semifinal, but didn’t score again all day, a string of 13 straight scoreless innings.

Riverton mustered just two hits and four base runners while striking out 14 times in the third-place game.

“You come up here to win a state championship, you don’t come here to try to win third place” Mitchell said. “It’s hard for everyone involved to get yourself back up to the intensity that you had in the semifinal, when you still had a chance at a championship. So we were kind of flat almost the whole game.”

Riverton was stifled by McLouth pitcher Kaitlyn Sparks. Sparks went all eight innings, allowing just two hits and two walks. She struck out the side in the second, fifth and eighth innings.

“We really were flat more offensively than defensively,” Mitchell said. “We played good defense in that second game, but we couldn’t get anything going offensively. We couldn’t make the adjustments to get hits when we needed them.”

Sophomore pitcher Haleigh Sills was the tough-luck loser in the third-place game. She went eight innings, allowing seven hits while striking out four. She twice put runners at second and third, but escaped to keep the game scoreless.

But then came the eighth.

Sparks led off with a rocket double to right-center and then moved to third on Missy Rome’s sacrifice bunt. Samantha Farris then drilled a Sills pitch over the head of Riverton right fielder Carleigh Hall to end the game.

“Take two hits away and we have a chance at third,” Mitchell said. “But that’s the way things go.”