It was a high drama Tuesday at the Eastman-Dodge Recreation Department as the Dodge County Middle School Lady Warriors hosted West Laurens with top seed and home field advantage in the upcoming region tournament on the line. Dodge would claim an early 4-1 lead, but the Lady Raiders would battle back to take a 5-4 lead going to the fourth. Dodge would tie the game at 5-5 and would send the game to extra innings. That set the scene for the shortstop Margaret Simmons as she shot a 3-0 pitch with two outs that scored Leah Creech from third with the game winner and a 6-5 Dodge win. With top seed in hand, Dodge will host Dublin Tuesday at 4:30 at the department. A Dodge win will bring the semi-finals and finals to Eastman on Saturday with games at 10:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m.
Briana Perdue got the start on the mound for the all important regular season finals. A lead off single would be quickly erased as catcher Faith Manning made a perfect throw to Simmons on a stolen base attempt for the first out. A one out walk put another Lady Raider on base. Obviously, she couldn’t remember how the first out occurred and Manning picked her off first, as she got too big of a lead off base. A ground out made it a most unusual 1-2-3 inning. Dodge went right to work in the bottom of the first. Leah Creech and Lindsey Crummey both forced walks on 3-2 pitches. Simmons got Dodge on the board on a single to left scoring Creech for a 1-0 Dodge lead. Simmons was questionable for the game as she was battling the flu for the last few days. One out later, Lizzie Massingill hit a double scoring Simmons and a 2-0 Dodge lead. At that time the lightening detector went off at the field as dangerous weather was within ten miles of the park. After the delay, Briana Perdue helped herself as she singled in Allie Parkerson for a 3-0 Dodge lead after the first inning.
The Lady Raiders would pick up a run in the second, but, Perdue would limit the damage with a pair of strikeouts and Dodge would lead 3-1 after an inning and a half. Dodge would answer the Raider run in the bottom of the second. Creech would score on a wild pitch and the Dodge lead would go back to 3 at 4-1.
The Lady raiders would continue to battle back. They would score a pair of runs in the third and fourth and claim their first lead at 5-4 going to the Dodge half of the fourth. Dodge would battle back in their half of the fourth. Crummey would get a single and a stolen base with one out. A two out walk to Allie Parkerson would put runners at first and second with two outs.
Massingill would get her second hit and RBI of the day as she drove in Crummey to tie the game at 5-5 going into the fifth.
The pitching for both teams would take over for the next couple innings. Dodge would change pitchers, as Haley Holloway would begin the fifth. Holloway would retire nine out of ten batters from the fifth to the seventh and Dodge would bat in the seventh and Dodge would bat in the seventh and final inning with the game still tied at 5-5. Massingill lead off the seventh with a walk and a single from Holloway set the table for Dodge with no outs. Faith Manning hit a line shot to left, but the ball was caught. The Lady Raiders would get out of the inning as the first base umpire just flat out missed a call at first that led to a double play that ended the inning. Folks, the call was real bad.
Anyway, the game would go to extra innings still tied at 5-5. In extra innings, the batter that made the final batted out goes to second with no outs. Why is that, you ask? I really don’t have a real good answer. I guess it’s to promote more offense. The Lady Raiders would get their runner to third with one out. Dodge elected to play the infield in to cut off the go ahead run it would pay off for Dodge. Simmons would handle the ground ball to short and she took the runner back to third and their runner was out at first for the second out. Holloway would retire the next batter on a grounder to mound and it would be Dodge’s chance as the game went to the bottom of the eighth still tie at 5-5.
A wild pitch with one out would put the winning run at third with one out. The Lady Warriors would try to win it on another wild pitch, but the home plate called the runner out on a bang-bang play at the plate. That emptied the bases with two out for the top of the Dodge order. Leah Creech would draw her second walk of the day to get things started. Crummey stayed hot with her fourth hit of the day to out runners at first and second with two outs setting the stage for Simmons. A wild pitch would put runners on second and third. It appeared that with first base open, they would pitch around Simmons. The first three pitches wear nowhere near the strike zone. Coach Jennifer Belflower gave Simmons the green light on 3-0 and she lined the pitch to center that scored Creech and Dodge took the top seed with a 6-5 win.
The top of the Dodge order had a huge day as Creech scored 3 runs and Crummey had four hits and two stolen bases. The softball is really good – come out and see this fine team play!
