Ooltewah's Bailey Kennedy, pulling into second base in Monday's Region 3-AAA softball semifinal against visiting Cookeville, drove in the game-ending run with a single in the Lady Owls' 11-1 victory at Jim Lovell Field.
photo by Dennis Norwood
After nailing down its first District 5-AAA tournament championship since 2008 on Saturday, Ooltewah’s streaking Lady Owls now have the Region 3-AAA title in their sights.
The Lady Owls (36-8) got consecutive RBIs from Tiera Lemon, Shelby Sutton, Allie Jones and Kayla Boseman in the second inning and cruised to an easy 11-1 six-inning shellacking of Cookeville in the regional semifinal at Jim Lovell Field on Monday.
“No, nothing’s easy,” Jones said.
“We came out and took care of business.”
Ooltewah will host district rival Walker Valley, which defeated District 6-AAA champion Rhea County, 7-0, in the other semifinal game.
The championship game will also be played at Jim Lovell Field at 7 p.m., to avoid a conflict with the school’s football spring game.
Ooltewah now has another date with district rival Walker Valley, which defeated District 6-AAA champion Rhea County, 7-0, in Wednesday's other semifinal game.
The championship game will also be played at Jim Lovell Field at 7 p.m.
Ooltewah and Walker Valley have played five times this season, with the Lady Owls taking a 3-2 series lead by beating the Lady Mustangs in the 5-AAA tournament title game at Bradley Central.
“I don’t care who we play,” Lady Owls coach Jon Massey said. “I think we’re built to play on the road and we’ve got two pitchers (Boseman and senior Cameron Baltimore) who aren’t fazed by playing somewhere else. But don’t get me wrong. I want to play at home.”
Wednesday’s winner moves on to the Class AAA sectional on Friday. A win there earns the advancing team a spot in the 2015 TSSAA Spring Fling championships in Murfreesboro.
“Each step we take (in the postseason) it feels much better,” Boseman said. “As a freshman, this is a great experience. For the seniors, Allie and Cameron, they didn’t get this far last year and they’re hoping to go further, and I’m just trying to get my team there.”
The Lady Owls, who stormed out of the loser’s bracket to win the district tournament in impressive fashion, scored one run in the first inning when Lemon scored on one of six Lady Cavaliers errors.
In the second, Lemon pushed a run across with a fielder’s choice and then Sutton, Jones and Boseman contributed successive RBI hits to give the Lady Owls a 5-1 lead. Sutton’s hit was a screaming double.
Ooltewah came back with two runs in the fourth.
Lemon reached on an error and Jones singled her to second. Boseman singled to score Lemon and Jones went to third. Mabry Carpenter’s groundout sent Jones home and the Lady Owls extended their commanding lead to 7-1.
Cookeville, held to three hits through four innings by Boseman, added singles by Claudia Hutchins and Heidi Smith in the fifth, but Boseman struck out Peyten Price to end the threat.
The Owls went down in order in the fifth. So did the Lady Cavaliers in the sixth and Boseman got her ninth and 10th strikeouts in the inning.
“I struggled in one inning, but my defense had my back today,” Boseman said. “Everyone was hyped. The coaches gave us a little pep talk and we came out ready to play.
Sutton led off Ooltewah’s sixth with her third hit of the game and Jones reached on an outfield error. Boseman’s double scored Lemon with the eighth run and put runners at second and third.
Carpenter singled to center to drive in a run and make it 9-1.
Aubie Collake flied out and Bailey Kennedy was next to the plate. During the Kennedy at-bat, Sutton scored on a wild pitch to extend the lead to 10-1 and Kennedy’s single pushed across the 11th run and ended the game.
“This is awesome,” Jones said. We won the district and we’re like, ‘Let’s go win region and go to sub-state.’ If we win region, ‘we’ll be like let’s go to sub-state and win the whole thing.’ We believe we can go further. I’m anxious to see what we can do.”
The Lady Owls banged out 12 hits and several players got in on the offensive action.
Boseman went 3-for-4 with a double and drove in three runs.
Carpenter was 2-for-4 with a double and two RBIs.
Jones also went 2-for-4 with an RBI and scored three times.
Sutton was 2-for-3 with a double, an RBI and also scored three runs.
“Timely hitting is the key,” Massey said. “You can sometimes get 12 hits in a game and only score two runs. Timely hitting helped out today. Shelby hit the ball hard all night. She hit a couple of rockets.”
LINESCORE
Cookeville 001 000 – 1 6 6
Ooltewah 140 204 – 11 12 0
Price, Funderburk and Barett; Boseman and Forrester.
(E-mail Larry Fleming at larryfleming44@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @larryfleming44)
Freshman pitcher Kayla Boseman checked Cookeville on six hits and struck out 10 on Monday as Ooltewah whipped the Lady Cavaliers, 11-1, to reach the Region 3-AAA softball title game. The Lady Owls will play rival Walker Valley at 7 p.m. on Wednesday.
photo by Dennis Norwood