By Joel Weckerly, Sports Editor

Highs and lows marked the beginning of the softball team’s season this past weekend at the Las Vegas Classic.

ACU played five games in the 16-team tournament from Thursday to Saturday, and came out of the desert with a 2-3 record.

The Wildcats started off Thursday with a 5-2 loss to Southern Colorado and a 10-2 loss to Alabama-Huntsville, then fell 9-1 to California-Bakersfield on Friday. They were able to make up for the shaky start, however, with a 10-1 win over Adams State Friday afternoon and a 4-1 victory over Fort Lewis in their final game Saturday.

“I think we started off with some first-game jitters,” Coach Carol Tabor said. “We were a little timid at first, but as the tournament progressed we improved so much. We had a lot more enthusiasm and ex-citement when we were playing the last two games.”

Junior pitcher Christina Yor-key led the way for ACU on the mound during the tournament. Despite taking the loss in the first game, the right-hander came back to record wins against both Adams State and Fort Lewis.

Tabor said she was encouraged by the prorgress the team made and said that patience would be the key for the young team.

“It’s important that we are patient,” Tabor said. “As the season goes on and we grow closer together, we’re going to improve. We’re already starting to gel well as a team, and it’s exciting.”

ACU receives another oppor-tunity to grow this weekend at the Lone Star Conference First-Pitch Tournament in Irving. The team is tentatively scheduled to play East Central Oklahoma and Northeast Oklahoma on Friday and Southeastern Oklahoma and Cameron on Saturday, though Tabor said the games could still be pushed back one day.