I headed out to Golden High School, about 15 minutes away from me yesterday to shoot Arvada West softball as they visited the Golden Lady Demons.  I did not know until the teams took the field that this game almost did not happen.  The announcement prior to the National Anthem was that one of the Golden players had died.  I found out after the game started that the police had called the administration at the school to let them know that one of their students had died evidentially the night before.  The team had a meeting and decided that this player would want them to go ahead and play this game against Arvada West.  I did not get the name, and there have been no reports in the paper or on the news as of yet on the death of a Golden student athlete.

Prior to the game starting, there was a moment of silence for the student.  So, it was an interesting start to the game that included threats of rain and lightning, about 40+ wasps that came out of the fence after a ball hit the top rail and disturbed their nest, and a lot of runs off the bats of Arvada West.

This time out, while parents and staff seemed friendly, the Golden coaching staff seemed cold.  Understandable due to the fact of the death in their team.  It appeared that they never had media shooting on the inside of the fence as they had no idea about media boxes.  The fences were short enough I could have shot over them, but with low fences, a lot of fans lined up along them to watch the game.  In the first inning, it was apparent to me that Golden was not in their right frame of mind as AWest took a 5 run lead in the top of the first and never looked back.

Golden was getting the bat on the ball, but was not getting on base, or if they did get on base, they could not get their base runners home.  AWest was playing a very tough defense, and a productive offense.  In the second and third inning Golden looked a lot better, holding AWest to no runs in both at bats, but still could not score any runs of their own.

The fielding is what really hurt Golden Tuesday evening.  What should have been an out at second above, had the tag miss because the fielder tried holding onto the ball with both hands instead of quickly swiping the glove at the runner/base for the tag.

Unfortunately for Golden, who won their last game 22-0, AWest came back alive with the bats in the 4th inning, tacking on 3 more runs for an 8-0 lead.  Golden held them scoreless in the 5th though, and started looking a little stronger at the plate.  You could almost sense that Golden was about to break out and start putting runs up on the board.

But every time Golden looked like they were about to score some runs, the AWest defense stepped up and stopped Golden cold.  AWest added another run in the 6th, and the talk from the AWest dugout was that they were going to 10 run Golden and finish the game early.  But after that one run in the 6th, Golden got some breaks with the defense, recording some easy outs with some pop flies.

But in the top of the final inning, AWest scored 3 more runs to increase their lead to 12-0.  The whole game AWest plays a good mix off hitting the ball for big plays, and controlling the bases with smart small ball and smart base running.

So the game ended in a 0-12 loss for Golden.  It was obviously a very emotional loss in many ways for the players.  I give them credit for taking the field. It was too bad that a power house team like Arvada West had to be their opponent for this game.  Taking a different roll this year, shooting multiple schools and not favoring any specifically (even though AWest will see me a lot since we are moving a couple blocks away from the school) I was really pulling for Golden to win, and I wish them the best the rest of this season.  I am sure I will see and photograph them again this year.

Had to include a shot of some geese flying over the school.  First animals I have photographed since getting to Colorado….

Next up for me will be a high school soccer game tomorrow with a football game right after, then the Pomona high school football game on Friday night.  Will make for a busy couple days.

*Update*
I found out this morning, August 30th, that the Golden player who died was Senior Breanna Hall.  Still very little has been released to the public regarding her death.  Thoughts and prayers to her family.