The nation's top-ranked women's junior college softball team (Chattanooga State) survived a 12-inning scare from Columbia State before finally prevailing 8-5 on Tuesday morning.
The Tiger baseball team lost 8-5 to Motlow State and was eliminated from the Region VII tournament being hosted by Chattanooga State.
The Lady Tigers were down 2-1 in the final inning (seventh) when Andrea Dalton hit a home run high over the leftfield fence to tie it. She homered again in the 12th after Lacye Walker deliverered a two-run double.
The 5-run outburst for the Lady Tigers gave them an 8-3 lead. But the Lady Chargers got a two-run home and then another base runner to again make it interesting.
Lady Tiger ace Ashley Czechner then got the next three batters to finally end the game that lasted over three hours.
Chattanooga State moves on to play a winners-bracket game scheduled for 6 p.m., but which will likely start much later.
The Lady Tigers are now 54-4.
They still face tough competition in the tournament from Volunteer State and Walters State, both of whom have outstanding records this season.
Chattanooga State, who were plagued by an uncharacteristic five errors in the contest, got on the board in the top of the second. Then the Lady Chargers pushed two runs across to lead until Dalton's heroics in the seventh.
Chattanooga State threatened in the eighth after Shelby Johnson got a hit over shortstop. Walker hit one near the wall in right that was caught. Johnson made it to second on the tag-up, and the Columbia State shortstop was ejected for rough contact on the close play. That inning ended with a groundout to third by Dalton.
The game was still tied 2-2 after nine innings, so the international tie-breaker was invoked in which each team started an inning with a runner on second base.
There was no score in the 10th, but both teams got across a run in the 11th to make it 3-3.