HOLMES TOWNSHIP (Crawford County Now) — Mohawk is in sole possession of first place in the Northern 10 Athletic Conference — at least for now.

It didn’t come easily or quickly, with a 50-minute weather delay due to lightning in the area, stopping play in the middle of the fourth inning. But the Lady Warriors prevailed 3-1 over Wynford to take the top spot in the league.

Mohawk is 8-1, with Wynford and Buckeye Central at 7-2 and Upper Sandusky at 6-2. The Lady Royals travel to Sycamore for a rematch on Wednesday.

“I didn’t really know what to expect after that delay,” Mohawk head coach Mindy Walton said. “I was kind of worried a little bit, but Aubrey (Gottfried) came out there and she was lights out after that. I was pretty proud of her for that.”

Gottfried was in command, fanning 15 Wynford batters and allowing just two base hits, while walking five.

Those hits were delivered by shortstop Lily Laipply, who had a double in the first inning and a single in the third.

“We knew coming into this game that it was going to be a challenge for us,” Walton said. “We put ourselves up against some pretty good challenges last week in a pretty good Lincolnview team and a very good Ontario team. We knew we had to bring the energy, and we were a little flat last week.”

Mohawk dropped identical 7-5 games to the pair of quality non-league opponents.

“We knew we had to put the ball in play, so I was really impressed with our dugout tonight. Just the energy and the motivation coming into this game was big knowing they had to win to stay on top of the league.

Wynford pitcher Rylee Robinson gave a solid effort in the circle, surrendering just three hits and striking out six.

Emily Brickner had two hits and Trenna Johnson one to lead Mohawk.

“Their pitcher is good. We didn’t make contact. She did a good job, and we were popping the ball up quite a bit, bunting especially, and also a couple in the outfield,” Walton said.

“She did a good job of keeping our hitters off balance. Hopefully, we can adjust a little bit better to that when we play on Wednesday.”

Wynford head coach Chelsea Rice pointed to the obvious, with her team allowing three runs in the third inning without yielding a hit.

A passed ball, an infield throwing error and a misjudged ball in the outfield resulted in three Mohawk runs and that was the difference.

“One inning got away, and a couple of hits. Both teams at the top and it’s little things. They’re aggressive and are coached well, and they knew what today meant,” Rice said.

The mistakes hurt more against a top team, she said.

“Everything matters. It was just one error that led to others. This game is over with, and we’ll take the loss. Wednesday, we’ll be ready, and the plan is to split.”

Tuesday is an off day for the Lady Royals.

“Practice will strictly be discipline. She (Gottfried) is a good pitcher. Rylee is. Grace Colleen (Buckette ace) is. We can’t help and those three are great pitchers,” Rice said.

“A rise ball that she likes, we don’t need to swing. A ball outside, we don’t need to swing. Tomorrow we’ll practice and trust each other and come out Wednesday.”

The non-league games will help Mohawk down the stretch.

“We did a good job against Lincolnview. They would score a run, we would score a run. I wanted more of that tonight and we didn’t make solid hits,” Walton said.

“We wanted some looks at some really good pitching and some really good defense. Hopefully that will help us as we wind down the regular season and get into tournaments.”

But first things first, with the second game against Wynford coming 48 hours after the narrow win.

“We all know how the N10 goes. Anything can happen,” Walton said.

“We have some veteran players, and they are well aware that you don’t beat a team and automatically walk out on the field and beat them the next time.”

Gottfried pitched four games in a row last week.

“You could see it kind of wearing a little bit when we played Ontario, but then she went and pitched on the weekend. We work a lot on her off-speeds and her spins. She came out and pitched well.”

Box score

Mohawk   003 000 0      3       3       0

Wynford   001 000 0      1       2       3

WP: Aubrey Gottfried (15 SO, 5 W)

LP: Rylee Robinson (6 SO, 0 W)

HR: None.

Triples: None.

Doubles: (W) Lily Laipply.

Multiple hits: (M) Emily Brickner; (W) Lily Laipply.

Records: Mohawk 14-3, 8-1 N10; Wynford 9-7, 7-2 N10.

Next: Ada at Mohawk, Tuesday; Wynford at Mohawk, Wednesday.