VIDALIA, La. &045; It’s good thing they didn’t quit after the end of the round robin play on Saturday.

Looking back on it now, that didn’t mean diddly squat.

By the time the dust settled on the first round of the bracket play in the coach-pitch sub-district tournament in Vidalia, the No. 1 seed was the first to go home for good, the No. 2 seed had to deal with losing real quick and the No. 3 seed is sitting on game away from advancing to Alexandria.

It’s South Franklin moving on to the championship today after taking a 9-7 win over Ferriday, the No. 4 seed that stunned No. 1-seeded Winnsboro in the first round. Ferriday and Vidalia play at 5:30 p.m. today, and the winner will face South Franklin at 7 p.m.

&uot;The teams are about as evenly matched as I’ve ever seen them,&uot; Ferriday coach Travis Brown said. &uot;Usually you’ve got one solid team that beats all of them, but here they’re all evenly matched. Winnsboro didn’t lose a game all week, and we beat them.&uot;

But it’s South Franklin, the team that didn’t look like a No. 3 seed in its two wins Monday over Ferriday and the Vidalia Nationals. South Franklin hit the ball well in its 14-6 win over Vidalia in the first game but really put it all together in the second game against a good Ferriday team.

South Franklin got key hits up and down the lineup and came up with some impressive defensive plays that you don’t see in the coach-pitch ranks too often.

&uot;When they’re up, we have a team that can beat just about anybody,&uot; South Franklin coach Rusty Wiggers said. &uot;They were happy. Every player on the team did an excellent job. Everything worked out great. We’re kind of confident, up and happy.&uot;

South Franklin got the key hits early in the game and late after Ferriday cut it to 8-7 in the fourth thanks to a three-run double from Dillon Smith. But in the fifth South Franklin tacked on an insurance run that may have been a momentum-booster when last batter Timothy Washam led off with a double and scored on a Hunter Jones single.

Ferriday, who went through a stretch of eight straight batters retired in the first three innings, went down in order in its last at-bat. Taylor Leslie reached first on an overthrow to start off the inning, but South Franklin had its right-fielder backing up the bag to throw out Leslie at second.

&uot;We made some great plays,&uot; Wiggers said. &uot;Everybody was on. They hit it well, and we defended it. The outfielders came through when we needed them. They were hitting the ball, and we made all the right moves. We missed some, but we had kids backing them up. They couldn’t turn singles into doubles.&uot;

Ferriday trailed 8-3 but struck big in the fourth when Smith’s shot that went to the fence drove in Tyler Pugh, Tyler Stockstill and Ty Brown with no outs. Smith scored on a single by Dylan Jones to cut the lead to one, but Jones got forced out at third to end the inning.

&uot;They played great,&uot; Travis Brown said. &uot;We made a couple of errors running the bases, but you’ve got to be aggressive. South Franklin is a good ball club. You can’t run on them that much, or they’ll throw you out. It was a heck of a game. Both teams played their hearts out.

&uot;They beat us twice, and hopefully we’ll get another shot at them.&uot;

Vidalia 15, Winnsboro 5

The Nationals exploded with eight runs in the first inning to take the quick lead and eventually ended the game in three innings due to the 10-run rule.

The Nationals got the rally going thanks to a double from Bryce Hamilton and a triple from Conner Smith. The Nationals tacked on two in the second and five in the third.

Dakota Hunt and Nathan Rogers each had doubles in the third for Vidalia.

South Franklin 14, Vidalia 6

South Franklin jumped out to a 9-0 lead before holding on for the first-round win over the No. 2-seeded Vidalia Nationals.

South Franklin, the No. 3 seed, got four in the first, two in the second and three in the third before the Nationals put a run on the board. In the first Robby Dearing’s triple scored Hunter Jones and John Robbins, and in the second Paul Garrett Jones and Blake Ezell came around for a 5-0 lead.

In the third South Franklin got a two-run home run from John Robbins, and Dearing tripled and later scored on a Lucas Moroni single.

Vidalia cut the lead to 9-6 thanks to a four-run fourth inning. William Anderson singled in Dakota Hall, Brock Woods’ double scored B.J. White, Anderson scored on a Nathan Rogers groundout and Woods scored on a fielder’s choice.

Ferriday 4, Winnsboro 3

Ferriday, the No. 4 seed in bracket play, pulled the shocker thanks to some solid defensive play and key hits.

Ferriday got two runs in the second and two more in the fourth to take the lead.