Lady Pats go 2-1 in Brookland

Lady Pats go 2-1 in Brookland

Marion loses heartbreaker to Valley View, tops Jonesboro and Nettleton

Sports Editor

It may be spring break for the Marion softball team, but the Lady Pats still found time to go 2-1 at a tournament in Brookland last Friday and Saturday.

In Friday’s opener, Marion hooked up with perennial state power Valley View, and despite carrying a 2-1 lead with it to the fifth inning, the Lady Pats lost its first game of the season, falling 3-2 on a walk-off.

Saturday was kinder to the home team as Marion slipped 6A-East rival Jonesboro 3-2 before Mabry Watson and Destiny King teamed up to shut Nettleton out 10-0.

After the 2-1 weekend, Marion is now 5-1 on the young season.

Valley View took a 1-0 with a run in the bottom of the first against Watson on Friday afternoon. The Lady Blazers would carry that lead with it until the top of the fifth inning when Marion’s bats came to life.

Despite its first two batters being retired in order, Marion sophomore Destiny King would single, as would the team’s lead-off hitter in Watson.

With two on, two out and facing a full count, Marion senior outfielder Morgan Weaver shot a ball into right field that would chase in both baserunners for a 21 Marion lead.

However, Valley View would get even in the home-half of the fifth when the Lady Blazers picked up an unearned run from the bottom of their order.

That score held until the bottom of the seventh when Valley View’s K.C. Cooney reached as the team’s leadoff hitter and scored on Allie Whitlock’s single.

Watson took the loss for Marion despite working 6 and 2/3 innings, allowing three runs (two earned), only five hits and striking nine Lady Blazers out. At one point, the senior fanned seven out of eight Valley View batters faced.

While the Lady Pats found themselves on the downside of a 3-2 decision on Friday, they were able to get back on top by that same score on Saturday against a Jonesboro team that Marion head coach David Horton has targeted as one of the most improved in the 7A/6AEast.

Once again, Marion had to come from behind as Jonesboro struck first in the bottom of the third, notching the game’s first run off of junior Hope Phipps.

However, Phipps would help her own cause when she singled and scored the equalizer on a Micah Tolleson RBI double in the top of the fourth.

Marion took its first lead in the fifth when King singled and scored on a Kristin Bolton RBI single for a 2-1 lead.

King and Bolton teamed up again in the top of the seventh when King reached on another single and Bolton scored her with a hit of her own for a 3-1 advantage that would eventually settle at 3-2 after Jonesboro got a run back in the homehalf of the seventh.

Phipps pitched a complete game for the win. She allowed six hits, two earned runs, striking one batter out while walking nobody. She moved to 2-0 in 2016.

After riding the razor’s edge in the tournament’s first two games, Marion got some breathing room in its finale in Jonesboro. The Lady Pats scored one time in the first and the third innings for a 2-0 lead, and blew the game open with four runs in the third and fourth innings for all of the offense that they would need in a 10-0 blanking of Nettleton.

Watson went back to work against the Lady Raiders, pitching the first three innings and allowed no hits in that time span. King relieved Watson in the fourth inning, and locked down the shutout, allowing just a pair of hits. Watson claimed her third win of the year, moving to 3-1 in the process.

Watson was 3-for-3 against Nettleton, including a two-run home run in the fourth inning. She also scored three times. Her first run was also the first run of the game, when she scored in the first inning on a ground-out from Phipps (23, 2 runs, 2 RBI).

Tolleson walked and scored in the second inning when first basewoman Haley Cook chased her in with a single for a 2-0 lead. Watson singled and Phipps doubled as two of the first three batters in the third inning and catcher Raygan Shelton chased in Watson when she reached on an error and Tolleson scored Phipps and Shelton with a single. McKenzie Shirley would send Tolleson home with a ground-out for a 6-0 Marion advantage.

The rally continued in the fourth when leftfielder Josey Moix singled and scored on Watson’s big fly. Weaver would walk and Phipps would reach on an error before Shelton scored Weaver with a ground-out and Phipps came around on a Bolton grounder.

Marion will play a varsity game at the Rivercrest Classic on Tuesday before jumping back into conference play on Thursday, March 31 when they host 2015 Class 7A runners-up Cabot for a doubleheader. The games will begin at 4:30 p.m.

Photo by Chuck Livingston

Marion junior Hope Phipps (12) rounds third during her team’s game against Little Rock Central last week.

By Chuck Livingston