North Greene and South Greene continued their suspended game from March 27 and competed in a 5-inning contest afterwards. The Lady Huskies carried their momentum over from last month and built upon it in Monday’s doubleheader with a pair of wins, 8-0 and 7-4, over the Lady Rebels.
“I feel like we were pretty sharp. I thought we played pretty good on defense for most of the day. Offensively, I guess we didn’t have a big explosion like we’d like, but I thought we had some good at bats overall and moved the runners and had the big hits when we needed them. I was pleased and the pitchers threw pretty well,” North Greene Head Coach Avery Weems stated.
Monday was not your ordinary game for either team. The first contest played at South Greene High School was suspended due to rain in the bottom of the fourth inning with one out. Both coaches chose not to end the game, but rather to play a modified doubleheader when South Greene visited North Greene. The action resumed exactly where both teams left off and another 5-inning game followed shortly after the conclusion of the suspended game.
The Lady Huskies never lost any steam from the game 17 days prior and built onto their lead leading to an 8-0 shutout in the first game. South Greene fell behind 4-0 in the second game before storming back to tie it 4-4. Adi Dean delivered a clutch 2-RBI triple and scored on an error in the sixth to deliver the go-ahead runs and help North Greene win the second.
Hannah Brooks pitched well 17 days ago and picked up right where she left off and finished with 14 strikeouts in the first game. Her final line was 7 complete innings allowing only 2 hits, no runs, no walks, with 14 Ks. Brooks was called upon to close out the second game and twirled another hitless inning with another strikeout.
“She had it rolling at South Greene before we were rained out and then today, she kept going so that was awesome to see,” Coach Weems said.
North Greene improved to 9-6 with both wins. South Greene suffered two losses and fell to 8-4.
The first game resumed in the 4th inning and North Greene went right back to adding runs to the scoreboard. In the 5th inning Kinlea Eastep reached safely on a bunt with two outs to score Heidi Trentham from third. In the 6th they scored two more to reach the 8-0 final score. Matti Phillips grounded out to third, but helped Josie Graham score from third. Kylee Listek scored on a wild pitch on the next at bat. South Greene only had one hit in the resumed portion of the first game.
Josie Graham had one of the craziest stat lines from the first game going 0-for-0 with 4 walks and 2 runs scored.
North Greene didn’t cool off and started the second game with 4 runs in the bottom of the 1st inning. Eva Leonard walked and stole second and was driven home with an RBI-single from Charlie Turnmire. Josie Graham drew yet another walk and put two aboard. Hannah Brooks cleared the bags with a 2-RBI double and scored both Turnmire and Graham. Heidi Trentham then scored Brooks on an RBI-single one pitch later.
South Greene was held hitless in the first two innings and had only mustered one hit in the 5.1 innings played so far up to this point. Things can quickly change in the game of softball and they did. Macy Roberts led off the 3rd inning with a single. Makenna Bent walked next and Whitney Reaves later singled to load the bases with one out. Kortnei Bailey was hit by the first pitch thrown and walked in the first run of the game for South Greene. Paisley Brobeck cracked the game wide open with a bases-clearing, 3-RBI triple to tie the score 4-4 in the 3rd inning.
The Lady Huskies struck back in the bottom of the 4th of a 5-inning game with Adi Dean’s big hit. Tralyn Southerland singled on the first pitch she saw to lead off. Kinlea Eastep singled next. Dean smacked one into the right field gap and drove home Southerland and Eastep and eventually was waved around third after an error in the field occurred. North Greene led 7-4 and only needed 3 outs to leave with the sweep. Hannah Brooks was sent in to close it and retired all three batters to seal the win.
“It was huge. And that’s something I had in mind was if we got the lead there, we were going with Hannah in the bottom half there and try to shut the door on it. That was awesome to see and awesome for us to jump out ahead there so we could finish it off,” Coach Weems expressed.
Brooks went 2-for-2 with 2 RBIs and a run. Dean went 1-for-3 with 2 RBIs and a run. Paisley Brobeck led South Greene going 1-for-2 with 3 RBIs.
North Greene travels to Sneedville on Tuesday for a game with Hancock County at 5:30 PM. South Greene hosts Happy Valley on Tuesday at 5 PM in a District 1-2A showdown.
