With both teams scoring in the first inning, Friday’s softball game between William Monroe and visiting Louisa County went dry immediately after. For the next five and half innings the two squads settled in behind solid pitching in defense. But in the bottom of the seventh with a runner on second and one out, Tiffany Snead stepped up to the plate and delivered a hit to drive in the game winning run as the Greene Dragons picked up a 2-1 win.
“There in the end with a girl on second, we thought about bunting,” said Monroe coach Chad Roach. “But I said ‘No, she’s going to get it done for us’ and she did and put it in the hole and we got the winning run across.”
The Lions jumped out early when Hali Goad hit a Brittany Marshall pitch to the gap in right center and rounded the bases to earn an inside the park homerun. Monroe answered right back though. After Taylor Collier reached base on a single, Marshall drove her in on a deep single of her own.
From that point forward, Marshall and Louisa pitcher Britanny Wratchford went toe-to-toe in a pitchers’ battle. The Dragons earned a handful of base runners on throwing errors to first, but could not turn those into runs as the Lions defense buckled back down.
With Marshall’s arm fading in the sixth, Collier took to the circle in relief with one out. The Lions then put a pair of runners on base on two singles, and advanced them both into scoring position, but a pop-fly and strikeout followed and Monroe escape unscathed.
The Dragons put a runner in scoring position in the ensuing inning with no outs hits from Collier and Snead, however Wratchford, much like Collier in the inning before, got a pop-fly and then struck out a pair of batters to wiggle out of trouble.
That wasn’t the case in the bottom of the seventh though. With one out, leadoff hitter Kasey Thomas reached first on an infield single and then took second when the Lions threw the ball away in a pickoff attempt. That set the table for Snead and the big hit.
“It feels really good,” Snead said. “We wanted this game so bad.”
For the Lions, it’s a tough loss but not one that they can’t get past.
“That’s just softball,” said Louisa coach Susan Sharp. “I thought we made too many errors tonight. But we’ll bounce back.”
Louisa (9-5, 6-3 Jefferson) heads to Western on Tuesday at 6 p.m.
Monroe (2-7, 2-5) will travel to Charlottesville also on Tuesday at 7 p.m.
