Bryan County’s softball team had to battle the elements and a boatload of nerves but fortunately the Redskins were able to prevail Tuesday night as they rallied to post a season-opening win over Bulloch Academy, 8-5, at Redskins Field.
The start of the game was delayed approximately 40 minutes due to heavy rainfall which swept through the Pembroke area. The field, Coach Jessica Shroeder-Cooper said, was underwater, but it eventually drained, and excess water was then swept away.
Cooper, starting her third season and coming off a Sweet 16 appearance in last year’s state playoffs, then trotted out a starting lineup which had six new starters, three of them freshmen, and there were some early jitters.
The newbies showed their mettle, however, as they rallied for four runs in the bottom of the sixth inning to overcome a 5-4 deficit and then had starting pitcher Lila Hannah enjoy her easiest inning of the night in retiring the Gators in order in the seventh to seal the win.
Emily Johnson, an all-region pick last year and the team’s only senior, led an eight-hit attack with a pair of singles good for an RBI and two runs scored. Hannah and catcher Peyton Scott, both juniors, join Johnson as the returning starters from last year.
The rest of the starting lineup had sophomores Emma Into in left field, Addilyn Blair in right field and Abby Robider on first base with freshmen Julie Koskela at shortstop, Chloe Good at second base and Cale Good at third base.
“We’re putting 14-year-olds in varsity-type situations and high intensity innings and they produced,” Cooper said. “We’ve had some rocky practices, been working through some things, working on who is going to start, who is going to be a leader.
“We all four (coaching staff) gave them kudos after the game for the fact they did not come out and succumb,” Cooper said. “We were worried how they were going to come out but they rose to the occasion.
“You could tell warming up there were a lot of nerves, a lot of freshman nerves, but they found some rhythm. They put themselves in some tough situations but they adjusted and got some things worked out.”
Bulloch Academy jumped on Hannah for a run in the first inning and was threatening to enjoy a big start with runners on second and third with only one out but the junior right-hander bowed her neck and worked out of it as she got a hitter to foul out to Scott and then ended the threat with a strikeout.
That basically was the way things went for the most part on the night for Hannah who left eight base runners stranded. She retired the side in order in the fourth and seventh innings.
The Redskins scored three runs in the second as Chloe Good followed Koskela’s RBI single with a two-run single to left.
Both teams scored in the third before the Gators got to Hannah for three runs in the fifth. Bryan County threatened in its half of the inning but couldn’t come up with a needed hit thus setting the stage for the sixth inning outburst.
The Redskins sent nine batters to the plate with Into leading off the inning by getting hit with a pitch. Koskela reached on an error and Chloe Good also got nicked by a pitch. After Into scored on a wild pitch Johnson singled up the middle to tie the score and
Good scored what proved to be the winning run when the BA catcher threw wildly into center field on Johnson’s steal of second.
Hannah iced it with an RBI single and then got the Gators to go down meekly in the seventh on a pair of routine fly balls to Johnson in center and a soft grounder to Cale Good.
The Redskins will now be off until Aug. 10 when they host Liberty County followed by games the next two days, a home game with Islands and a rematch at Bulloch Academy.