ATLANTIC – Atlantic’s softball team went 1-2 over the weekend as it hosted its annual Trojan Invitational on Saturday and a three-team round-robin event the night before.

The Trojans salvaged the weekend with a 10-4 win over Exira-EHK/Audubon in the only game that got in before rain moved into southwest Iowa. Riverside was the other scheduled opponent, and they pulled the upset 5-3 win over Iowa Class 3A No. 5 Estherville-Lincoln Central.

The Spartans were to have played the Midgettes in the other game on Saturday. Riverside is on an early-season roll, with a win over the Spartans as one of their other signature wins.

Friday night, the Trojans fell to two top-10 teams: Estherville-Lincoln Central 4-2, and defending Class 4A champion Carlisle 7-1.

Against Class 4A No. 7 Carlisle, the Trojans scored their lone run after falling behind 4-0. That happened after Zoey Kirchhoff had a triple to deep center, and then scored on Dylin Ball’s grounder to short.

The Wildcats would add three more runs later in the game to win going away, holding off a Trojan rally attempt that saw Ball and Jilian Saathoff get on with two out but ultimately left stranded.

Trojan coach Terry Hinzmann was happy with how his team’s defense – even if guilty of four errors – minimized the damage and never let the Wildcats get on a big roll.

“We know (coach Jim) Flaws, and he’s got all the tricks of the trade down pretty good, so we knew they were going to challenge us defensively and keep us at the top of our game,” said Hinzmann. “That’s great for us at this point in the season and that got exposed very quickly.”

In the opener against E-LC, the Trojans got an RBI single from Zoey Kirchhoff and two hits and an RBI from Makenna Schroeder. The Midgettes jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead but the Trojans responded by tying the score in the bottom half of the first inning.

The score remained tied as both teams had good chances, but it was E-LC who regained the lead with RBIs by Haylee Stokes and Hillary Ruschy. The Trojans went in order in the bottom half of the inning.

“That game could have went either way. We had runners in scoring position to go ahead in the sixth inning and did not come through,” said Hinzmann. “The difference in the ballgame was that when they got runners in scoring position even with two out, they did come up with the big hit.

“They’re one of the better teams in Class 3A and we saw one of the better pitchers in Rylie Yeager. We had a good approach at the plate and you’re probably not going to get a lot of hits off her. We probably did about as good of a job as we possibly could.”

The game against Exira-EHK/Audubon went well.

“We knew they were going to be ready to play. I felt our kids came through when they tied the score at 3-3 and we got some more runs,” said Hinzmann.

The Trojans will play Council Bluffs Lewis Central in a doubleheader on Monday.