Turns out, they didn’t need to.
Playing sound defense and putting the ball in play on offense, Rogers took advantage of seven Academy errors to end the Lady Bumblebees’ season 9-4 on Monday night in a play-in game for District 25-2A’s final playoff berth.
“It’s a great feeling,” said Rogers coach Kristie Waits, whose team went 4-3 in the first half of district play and were tied for fourth before winning five of its last seven in the regular season. “We started out in the middle of the pack and we dug ourselves a hole and had to battle back. End result, we’re going to the playoffs.”
Rogers (15-8) moves on to meet District 26-2A runner-up Onalaska in a Class 2A bi-district playoff game on Friday. Likely sites for the three-game series are Brenham or College Station.
Academy, who defeated Salado last Friday to force a one-game playoff against Rogers, ended its season at 18-9.
“I’m still proud of what my girls have accomplished this season,” Academy coach Brian Pursche said. “Nobody expected us to be in this position.”
Whereas the Lady Bees were the beneficiaries of seven Salado errors last Friday, Academy’s defense hurt themselves against Rogers.
Academy gave up six unearned runs with three of them coming in a decisive sixth inning after the Lady Bees had closed the gap to 5-4.
The first three Lady Eagles - Cheyenne Marshall, Gabbie Mendoza and Laci Abel - all reached base to start the inning.
Then, No. 9 hitter Angela Garcia reached base on Academy shortstop Selina Owens’ throwing error to bring home courtesy runner Suzanne Schiller for a 6-4 lead.
After the Lady Bees forced out two runners at the plate, Academy starting pitcher Hillary Sheets’ pitch got away from catcher Sarah Lisenbe to score Garcia. Sheets retrieved the ball and tried to throw out Nicholyn Carter-Maddux at third, but the ball sailed into left field scoring Carter-Maddux and Brittany Luna for a 9-4 lead.
“It’s not that the girls weren’t trying or anything like that,” Pursche said. “But when you’re playing a playoff-caliber team you can’t make those mistakes that we did tonight. We had to earn our runs and we pretty much gave them their runs with our errors.”
Kendra Hinze relieved starter Carter-Maddux in the fifth inning and shut down the Lady Bees. She allowed no hits, walked two and hit a batter while recording eight groundouts to seal the victory.
Rogers committed two errors, both in the first inning that helped Academy grab an early 2-0 lead.
Carter-Maddux, Emily Fares, Hinze, Marshall, Mendoza and Abel each had a single for the Lady Eagles.
Ashley Dolezel, Hailey Heatherley and Lara Price, whose RBI single in the fourth trimmed Rogers’ lead to 5-4, each had a single for Academy.
“We relied on our defense to keep our momentum and shut them down a bit,” Waits said. “We just had to wait for our bats to come alive.”
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