MURFREESBORO – The first-ever state softball tournament
experience for the CSAS Lady Patriots didn’t last nearly long enough.
It was a disappointing two-and-out performance for the Lady
Patriots following a 13-6 defeat against Columbia Academy on Wednesday morning
in the losers bracket here at the StarPlex Field No.
4.
CSAS was stunned by two-run homer in the seventh inning of
Tuesday’s opening round loss to McKenzie, but Wednesday’s game wasn’t nearly as
close.
The Lady Bulldogs may have been a bit nervous at the start
as they made three of their four errors in the first two innings as CSAS
overcame an early 1-0 deficit for a 5-1 lead after two frames.
The bats came to life in a big way for the Lady Bulldogs in
the third as they sent 10 hitters to the plate with seven of them scoring.
The big blow was a grand slam homer by number-nine hitter
Anna Katherine White.
The Lady Patriots were able to score one more run in the
fourth, but the Lady Bulldogs added single runs in the fourth and fifth before
putting an exclamation point on the game with a three-run seventh, which came compliments of a three-run homer
by Jordan Brown, her 15th round-tripper of the season.
It was a tough way for the Lady Patriots to end what had
been a very good season with their first-ever district tournament and region
championships before advancing to the Spring Fling for the first time.
Coach Kaity Holloway was on the verge of tears when the game
ended as this was a special group for her as her seven seniors had been setting
the stage since she took the job three years ago.
“I’m so proud of these girls, but this is a bittersweet
experience for me,” Holloway said after a post-game talk with her girls.
“These girls have done something that nobody has done before
and they did it well. They gave us a lot
of positive opportunities these last three years. Filling those seven jerseys next spring will
be the toughest job I’ve ever had as a softball coach.
“We hit it well today, but our hats are off to Columbia
Academy as they hit it well too. There
are days when a little bit of luck goes a long way and sometimes you get the
short end of the stick. But I love these
girls and couldn’t be more proud of what they accomplished as a Lady Patriot,”
Holloway added.
Lady Bulldog coach Brad Bradley was just happy that his
offense finally got untracked after his team got blanked on Tuesday.
“Our bats finally woke up today as we didn’t hit very well
yesterday. We sort of opened it up in
the third and those seven runs helped settle everyone down.
“We knew that CSAS had a good team and an outstanding
pitcher, so I really wasn’t expecting to score that many runs today. But I guess we were just hungry to hit,” he
added.
Sydney Sproul, Brown and White all had three hits as the
Lady Bulldogs finished with 15 for the game.
Victoria Blanton and Jamani Greer both had two hits to lead
CSAS.
Baylee Terranova was the winning pitcher while Brianna
Taylor suffered the loss.
CSAS ends its season at 26-12-1.
COLUMBIA ACADEMY
107 110 3 – 13 15 4
ARTS & SCIENCES
320 100 0 – 6 8 2
Terranova and Goats; Taylor and Suttles.
(email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@comcast.net)