Southern softball extends winning streak
May 1—Southern Lee softball is at a point where every victory is setting a new school record.
The Lady Cavaliers already own the school records for the most wins and longest winning streak in program history. They extended both Monday night with a 12-1 rout of Hoke County in the first round of the Sandhills Athletic Conference tournament.
Southern, now 12-7 on the season, won its seventh straight game. A program which had, in years past, gone entire seasons without a win has done nothing but win for three weeks.
The Lady Cavaliers scored three runs in the first inning and then scored three more in the third, fourth and sixth innings. The game ended on a walk-off two-run homer in the bottom of the sixth by Natalie Guevara, who went 3-for-4 with a double, two homers, two runs scored and six RBI.
Teammate Carrie Ellen Bryan, who scored ahead of Guevara on the home run that ended it, also had a huge game, going 2-for-4 with a walk, a hit-by-pitch, two home runs, four runs scored and four RBI. The two had all 10 Southern Lee RBI in the win.
Albani Hooker pitched a three-hitter and allowed just one unearned run with six strikeouts.
Bryan's first homer bookended the one by Guevara, producing the game's first two runs. Maggie Lucas led off the first with a walk, and with one out, scored ahead of Bryan when the latter hit one out to right field.
The Bucks scored a run in the third, but thunder and lighting roared and struck in the Southern half of the inning. Bryan hit a 3-0 pitch over the left-field fence, and then Guevara got behind 0-2 in the count but hit the fourth pitch she saw deep to center.
The score was 6-1 when Guevara struck again in the fourth. Lucas and Hooker drew walks, and then Hoke somehow decided that intentionally walking Bryan to get to Guevara was a good idea. She looked at a ball and then crushed a hard liner into left field that cleared the bases.
Lucas walked twice and scored twice, and Hooker also scored two runs. Sydney Bisson went 1-for-3 and scored the team's other run, while Brooke Simmons had a triple.
Southern played at Union Pines in a late Tuesday semifinal game.
Richmond 7, Lee County 2In another first-round SAC tournament game Monday night, the Lady Raiders traveled to Lee County and scored a 7-2 win.
The game was a pitcher's duel between Richmond's Madelyn Pearson and Lee's Savanna Mullins until late in the game. The Lady Raiders took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first, but then the hurlers matched zeroes until Richmond scored four times in the fifth to take control. Each team scored twice in the sixth, but nothing in the seventh. Both pitchers went the distance, with Mullins striking out 11 and Pearson 10.
Richmond (7-10) played error-free ball, while two miscues were credited to the Lady Jackets.
Lee got its runs in the sixth. Mullins was hit by a pitch leading off, and Imani Chubbs doubled to put both into scoring position. With one out, a Kendall Mims groundout brought Mullins in. Chubbs scored on a passed ball moments later.
Kallie Byrd was 1-for-1 with two walks as Lee's leadoff batter, but no one had more than one hit.
Lee County will have to wait until the weekend to see if its season will continue. The Lady Jackets are presently 28th in the NCHSAA 3A East RPI and will make the playoffs if they remain in the top 32. No. 1 Scotland, No. 10 Union Pines, and No. 13 Southern Lee are safely in the field from the SAC 3A.
