MURFREESBORO – The North Greene softball team’s path to a state championship got a little tougher on Wednesday night after they came so close but fell to McEwen 2-1 in the Class 1A State Tournament.
“I thought that we battled. I was proud of the girls for fighting until the end,” North Greene coach Avery Weems said. “That is a really good pitcher that we just faced. Tonight was a really tough matchup, but we competed. It’s a tough way to end, but its not one play. There a were bunch of plays throughout the game that we could have done better.”
The Lady Huskies are not done and they will be back in action on Thursday at 1:30 PM central time against the winner of Gordonsville and Dresden. That game is suspended and will pick back up at 9 AM on Thursday. North Greene will have to win three games on Thursday to advance to Friday’s state championship game.
“We’ll get some food in our bellies, and hopefully get them some rest a before we come back and do it tomorrow,” Weems said. “We’ll have another tough game tomorrow, but I hope these girls learned that they can compete with these really good teams. We’re a good team and we have a chance against anybody in this tournament.”
Both teams had to wait over five hours from the originally scheduled start time to begin play on Wednesday after heavy rain storms passed through Murfreesboro. After the long wait McEwen’s Laila Downs was in a hurry to get the Lady Warriors’ offense started and on the first pitch of the night she rocketed a home run over the fence in left-center field.
After that a pitchers’ duel settled in at McKnight park. North Greene could not touch McEwen sophomore Ava Lastovka as she retired the first 11 batters she faced in order.
“I told the girls that she’s going to be a power five pitcher, maybe an SEC pitcher one day. She’s really good. Her velocity was tough to handle. She throws it up in the top of the zone, which makes it hard to stay on top of,” Weems said.
North Greene’s Hannah Brooks retired 10 straight batters into the fourth inning before Kylie Ange reached on a walk. Morgan Henry followed by banging a single off the left field fence.
Pinch runner Kynlee Nix scored to make it 2-0 when Carly Baker sent a sacrifice fly into centerfield.
North Greene found little offensive success on Wednesday with Tralyn Southerland earning the lone hit, a single up the middle in the fourth inning.
Despite that it looked like Mother Nature might provide the Lady Huskies with a path to victory. As the bottom of the seventh inning rolled around the rain started coming down hard once again, and Lastovka lost her ability to control the ball.
With two outs McEwen’s star hurler walked four straight batters which allowed North Grenee’s lone run to score. There were no signs that her control would improve as the conditions were getting wetter.
The ball got away on her first delivery to Heidi Trentham. At third Addi Dean made a brief attempt to the plate, but quickly retreated. At the same time Kylee Listek took off for third from second and then had to turn around. McEwen was able to catch her before she made it back to second and the game ended with the tying run on third.
Lastovka finished the night with 15 strikeouts, five walks and one hit allowed.
Brooks struck out four, walked two and allowed three hits.
