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NEWPORT — Following the injury of a star player, the Newport High School softball team was eliminated from the 2026 District 6 2B Fastpitch Softball Tournament last week.
Later named Co-Offensive Player of the Year in the Northeast 2B North league, Bella Boyd sustained an injury during Newport’s pre-tournament game against Freeman, Tuesday, May 5. While a Freeman player was sliding to second base, her softball cleat hit Boyd’s knee, resulting in a hospital visit, three stitches and her absence at the tournament, where Newport was eliminated after two straight losses.
“Bella couldn’t play for us while she was recovering from the knee injury she sustained against Freeman,” Newport coach Steve Braun says.
Four other Grizzly girls were also selected for the North All-League Team: Grace Parry, Lilli Hall, Alyssa Dibble and Genica Kreider.
“The season did not end the way we hoped,” Newport coach Steve Braun says. “But overall it was a very good season.”
Before the tournament, second-seeded Newport (13-9, 12-3) hosted first-seeded Freeman (19-3, 10-1) Tuesday, losing 13-0.
“Freeman was a good team going into the game,” Braun says. “We knew going into this game that it wasn’t going to be easy.”
Neither team scored until the fourth inning, when Freeman hit 3 runs. Between the fifth and sixth innings, Freeman added 10 more runs to their score.
Hall and Parry had one hit each. “We were not able to answer them back with runs of our own,” Braun says.
Newport played their first and second games of the tournament Friday, May 8 at the Dwight Merkel Sports Complex in Spokane.
Colfax (12-9, 8-5) was Newport’s first opponent, defeating the Grizzlies 6-3.
“Our game against Colfax was good,” Braun says. “They are a tough team.”
Colfax took an early 3-run lead over Newport between the first and second innings. When Newport scored 3 runs in the fourth inning, Colfax stayed ahead with 2 more runs. Then, Colfax scored another run in the sixth inning.
Jasmine Billiter led Newport with 1 RBI and 2 hits. Julie Bowman, Alyssa Dibble, Hall, Kreider and Makayla Peone each added one hit.
“We played fairly well against them,” Braun says. “Especially since we had to put people in different positions.”
Later in the evening, Newport played fifth-seeded Asotin (4-19, 1-11) in a loser-out game and was eliminated after losing 16-4.
“Our game against Asotin did not go very well,” Braun says.
Newport managed to keep pace with Asotin in the first inning, scoring 2 runs where Asotin scored 3. However, Asotin continued to add to their score in the second and third innings, a total of 5 runs. Though Newport scored another 2 runs in the fourth inning, Asotin outscored them with 5 runs, then added another 3 runs to their score in the fifth inning.
Alyssa Dibble led Newport with 1 RBI and three hits, followed by Parry with 1 RBI and two hits. Bowman added three hits, Kreider, Brianna Dibble and Abby Martin one hit each.
“As a team, we did not play like we had all season long,” Braun says. “And we got frustrated.”
