For five and a half innings the Trigg County Lady Wildcats and the Madisonville-North Hopkins Lady Maroons were locked up in a scoreless pitchers duel. But, when the Lady Maroons saw the door open just a crack, they ran right on through.
Madisonville scored three runs in the bottom of the sixth inning and that was all the scoring for the night as the Lady Maroons upended the Lady Wildcats 3-0 Thursday night in Madisonville. The loss avenged a Lady Maroon loss to the Lady Wildcats in 10 innings on the opening day of the season.
Trigg County’s Tember Oliver and Madisonville-North Hopkins’ Sadie Kirk, two of the region’s best young pitchers, were dueling back and forth for the first five and one-half innings with each giving up only one hit. But the door cracked a bit to open the bottom of the sixth.
Bryanna Harris walked to lead off the inning. With an 0-2 count, Sadie Kirk took the pitch and went with it the opposite way into the right-center gap driving in pinch-runner Makenzie Brown with the first run of the game.
Mackenzie Stoltz then came to the plate for the final time in a home game in her high school career and crushed a two-run shot to left center to push the lead out to 3-0 and that would be that.
Stoltz then took to the home mound one final time to close out the game in the top of the seventh and appropriately ended the game by striking out the final batter she faces.
Kirk went six innings giving up just one hit, striking out seven and walking none in picking up the win.
Tember Oliver went six innings for the Lady Wildcats in the circle, giving up three runs on five hits, striking out seven and walking two.
