UNION — Under normal circumstances, red and yellow do not make blue.

In this case, former Belle Lady Tiger Ryleigh Long and Vienna Lady Eagle Abrea Simmons traded their previous school colors for East Central College (ECC) blue this past spring on the softball diamond.

“As competitive as we both were in high school, it has been fun being teammates with Ryleigh (Long),” Simmons said. “We’ll have one more year together and hopefully we can help the Lady Falcons have a winning season next spring.”

Appearing in 15 games, Simmons got the start in nine of them before ending her freshman season with a 3-7 record.

She earned her first win back on March 18 against Culver-Stockton College (CSC) pitching a complete game allowing four runs on nine hits and four walks to go with nine strikeouts.

Nearly a month later, Simmons would earn her second win of the season and reach double digits in strikeouts at the same time.

In game one of an April 9 doubleheader against Central Methodist University’s (CMU) JV squad, Simmons threw another complete game allowing one run on seven hits and two walks to go with a new career-high 10 strikeouts.

ECC went on to sweep the doubleheader from CMU’s JV by scores of 8-1 and 8-0.

Abrea’s third and final win of the spring came in a relief role.

On the road at Mineral Area College on May 2, Simmons pitched a scoreless inning of relief allowing just one hit while striking out two Lady Cardinal batters.

Seeing action in 35 of ECC’s 40 games this past spring, Long had hits in 16 of them.

Facing Central back on Feb. 16, Long had a pair of doubles, three runs batted in (RBI) and a run scored for her firsts in those statistical categories.

Long finished with six doubles on the season putting her in a tie for second place on the team with Alexis Smalling and Ryan Stutzman.

Fast forward to March 12, Long set a new career high for hits in a game with three against Southwestern Illinois.

Of those three hits, one was Long’s first collegiate home run.

Ending up with three round trippers on the season, Long tied for third on the team with Anna Arman and Smalling.

Long’s other two home runs came in both games of an April 6 home doubleheader against St. Louis Community College.

Among four players that hit a triple for ECC last spring, Long’s lone three-bagger came against CMU’s JV in game two of an April 9 doubleheader in Union.

Also hitting a triple for ECC softball was Kylie McDaniel, Lexi Lewis and Avery Little.

Recording three RBIs in a game three times, Long finished with 20 for the season putting her tied for second with Payton Robinson.

Drawing a season-high three walks in March 21 action against St. Charles Community College, Long finished with 11 free passes for the season putting her fourth on the team.

Scoring 15 runs for the Lady Falcons, Long was tied for sixth on the team in that department.

Racking up 28 hits on the season, Long was sixth for the Lady Falcons.

Recording a .308 batting average, Long was fourth in that department while also posting a .388 on-base percentage also good for fourth place among ECC Lady Falcon softball players this past spring.

Posting a .495 slugging percentage, Long was third for ECC in that category.

“It was nice to be teammates with Abrea (Simmons) after having to face her as a pitcher for four years,” Long said. “I’m looking forward to one more season with her as a teammate.”