Lady Rams’ fall in tournament

Published 12:15 am Sunday, August 12, 2007

LIBERTY — Centreville Academy’s and Wilkinson County Christian Academy’s fast pitch softball teams have been going in completely different directions this season.

Heading into the double-elimination Amite School Center Tournament on Saturday, the Lady Tigers were 6-1 overall and 2-0 in district play. The Lady Rams, on the other hand, were a disappointing 1-5.

So it seemed logical that Centreville would go deep in this tournament, perhaps all the way to the finals, while WCCA would be two and done. Right? Wrong. In fact, the opposite almost happened.

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The Lady Rams almost ended up being one of the last five teams remaining and went 3-2 in tournament play to improve to 4-7. But the shocker had to be the play of the Lady Tigers, who scored just one run in going 0-2 in the tournament.

WCCA got off to a tough start, had just four hits in a 2-0 loss to Copiah Academy in its first game. The Lady Rams, however, stayed alive by stunning Brookhaven Academy 10-1 thanks to nine runs in the bottom of the first inning, and then defeating Amite School Center’s B team 16-4 in two innings.

Bethany Fletcher had a triple and Abby McDuff went 2-for-2 in WCCA’s win over the Lady Cougars of Brookhaven Academy.

In the Lady Rams’ second win of the day, WCCA head coach Ray Olive said he didn’t realize his team was taking on the host school’s B-team until after the game had started. He let his varsity players bat once, with the exception of Hannah Ashley, who went 2-for-2 with two doubles. The Lady Rams scored 14 runs in the top of the first inning.

Two of the three hits the Lady Rebels’ B-team had went for extra bases. Kacy Nunnery hit a home run and A. Picard had a double.

Thanks to the pitching and hitting of Bethany Fletcher, the Lady Rams rallied to defeat the Silliman Lady Wildcats 5-3. Fletcher held Silliman to three hits and hit the game-winning, three-run home run in the top of the second inning after Mary Claire Netterville and Caroline Walker each got on with a base hit.

Centreville, which has gotten good pitching, solid defense and timely hitting in six of its first seven games of the season, lost its first game of the day to Franklin Academy 2-0 and then was eliminated by Bowling Green School 4-1 to fall to 6-3 on the season.

Trinity Episcopal went a respectable 1-2 in tournament play. The Lady Saints lost to the Oak Forest Lady Yellow Jackets 7-3 before defeating the ACCS Lady Rebels 13-4. Five players had at least one hit for the Lady Saints in their win over ACCS. Trinity was eliminated by the Lady Colonels of Copiah Academy in a low-scoring game, 2-1. Alyx Atkinson pitched all three games for the Lady Saints.