By REID TUCKER
A three-run rally in the top of the sixth did the trick for Chipley, propelling the Lady Tigers to the Region 2 softball final over the district championship-winning South Walton club.
The Lady Seahawks (18-6) hosted the semifinal game on the night of Tuesday, April 28, and actually had the lead going into the fateful sixth inning slump resulting in Chipley’s 3-1 win. The first three-and-a-half innings of play were a tapestry woven of superlative throw-outs and routine catches, as both sides flexed their considerable defensive muscles. There had only been two hits until the bottom of the fourth, and both were for Chipley (16-10), though neither resulted in anything more than a stranded base-runner.
That changed in the bottom of the frame, when South Walton’s Lia Johnson, Maci Roundtree and Rebecca Hubbard all reached on singles, the last of which scored the speedy Johnson. Roundtree and Hubbard were both stranded on-base thanks to back-to-back strikeouts from Chipley pitcher Grace Gilbert, the better pitcher of the night by virtue of having gunned down more batters. She had seven Ks to the two of South Walton’s Alyssa Selvey, though they gave up a comparable number of hits – seven for Gilbert and eight for Selvey.
Chipley had a chance to tie the game in the top of five after a walk and a hit were allowed by Selvey, but a clean 6-3 play halted the Lady Tigers in their effort. Similarly, South Walton could have run up a sizeable lead in the bottom of the same inning, putting Selvey, Alexia Parker and Johnson on-base, but all three were stranded by a strikeout from Gilbert and an easy out following a pop up to right field. The inning drew to a close, and all indications pointed to the game being decided by the team that slipped up first.
That was when things went from testy to dicey for the Lady Seahawks. Selvey had a disastrous sixth inning, giving up four hits – one a two-RBI double from Mary Rosalyn Taylor hit hard on the ground all the way to the center field fence – after her infield team mates allowed two runners to reach first on errors. The fracas added up to a 3-1 lead for Chipley before South Walton could get out of the inning, and the Lady Tigers held on to that advantage for dear life with a three-up-three-down performance in the bottom of the inning.
Chipley could have easily added another three or four runs in the top of the seventh inning, as Gilbert doubled to deep left and two of her team mates got on thanks to a walk and a wild pitch to load the bases. South Walton’s two outs early in the frame and a nice play at second prevented that outcome, though it soon faced the final at-bat of the season. Selvey (2-for-3 on the night) singled, and Johnson went down swinging trying to work a slap bunt, with her last miss bringing an end to the Seahawk’s post-season run.
