Lookout Valley's aggressiveness offensively made up for its shoddiness defensively Saturday, albeit barely.
The Lady Yellow Jackets squeezed home the tiebreaking run in the sixth inning and held on to defeat South Pittsburg 5-4 in the District 6-A high school softball tournament at Lookout Valley.
Lookout Valley (18-8) advances to a winners-bracket semifinal against regular-season champion Whitwell, which is hosting the rest of the tournament, Monday at 5 p.m. EDT.
The Lady Yellow Jackets got an infield single from Savannah Rains starting the bottom 0f the sixth, and her steal of second was one of their five in five tries. Coach David Dinger flashed the bunt sign to Jordan Cabrera, who with a full count was able to sacrifice Rains to third. The Lady Pirates tried to make the play at the plate on next batter Zoe McGlamery's bunt, but to no avail.
"That 3-2 bunt Jordan got down was big," Dinger said. "A lot of little things happened for us. We had some baserunning situations we capitalized on. There in the sixth we had good speed on third with a good bunter at the plate. We had to get that run in, and I thought that was our best choice."
Lookout Valley scored twice in the first inning. South Pittsburg coach Vic Grider said he liked the fight in his team to overcome that and take a lead by the top of the third.
Four of the Lady Pirates' seven hits off winning pitcher Katie Dinger came in a three-run third, which could've been a larger outburst. They had one baserunner thrown out and also left the bases loaded.
"I thought she threw well, but we had some trouble in the third," Coach Dinger said of his daughter. "That could've been a lot bigger. To her credit, she backed up that play at home and was able to throw that runner out at third. That was another of the little things that happened for us, because she was being where she was supposed to be."
Casey Crownover hustled her way into a triple in the bottom half of the inning and Faith Payne, who was 2-for-2 with two RBIs, hit a sacrifice fly to tie the game at 3. Two innings later Beth Crownover walked, stole second, moved to third on a groundout and scored on a wild pitch.
The Lady Pirates also benefited from a hustle play when leadoff batter Kayla Coffelt was able to score from second on Hunter Elwood's groundout. That made it 4-4 and set the stage for the finish.
"It always seems to come down to the last at-bat when we play each other," Grider said. "You have to play to the end. Congratulations to them. They made the plays in the end, but I'm proud of how we battled."
Grider's daughter, Victoria, went 2-for-3 with a double and scored a run in her final game for South Pittsburg (20-7). Coffelt and Morgan Aker, who contributed an RBI single, are the team's other seniors.
"Those three seniors have stuck with us through some really hard times," Coach Grider said. "They kept believing in what we were selling and got to feel some of the benefits this year. We won 20 games. We were able to win a tournament. I think what they did says a lot about those three girls and what kind of people they're going to be down the road."
Contact Kelley Smiddie at ksmiddie@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6653. Follow him on Twitter @KelleySmiddie.