The Tennessee Association of Vintage Base Ball season opens today in Georgia, actually, with the two Chattanooga clubs hosting Nashville-area teams at the old polo grounds in Fort Oglethorpe — at the 6th Cavalry Museum. Mountain City faces the Nashville Maroons at noon, and the Lightfoot Club is scheduled to take on the Franklin Farriers at 2:30. The matches will be played without gloves and by the gentlemen’s rules of the 1860s, and uniforms reflect that era as well. Spectators also are welcome to dress in period attire, but that is not a requirement. The next games for the 10-club league will be next Saturday in Knoxville. The Chattanooga clubs play next on April 18, again in a doubleheader at the 6th Cavalry Museum.
Softball
* Kaylie Drew was 7-for-7 with a grand slam and seven RBIs in all as Lee University beat visiting Delta State 7-5 and 10-4 in Gulf South Conference softball Friday. She and Dominique Hannah each had three hits and scored twice in the first game, when Emily Dagnan was 2-for-3 with a three-run home run and winning pitcher Leigh Beatenbough was 2-for-2. Drew had two doubles in addition to her slam in game two, when Amanda Lynn was 3-for-4 and scored twice, Hannah was 2-for-4 and scored twice and Dagnan and Qiley Lewis each was 2-for-3 with an RBI in support of Angie Hughes’ five-hit, 13-strikeout pitching for the Lady Flames (26-12, 13-8). Mariah Alvarez hit a three-run homer for Delta State (14-16, 5-11). Kassidy Tally was 2-for-3 with two RBIs in game one.
* The 11th-ranked Tennessee softball team bounced back Friday night from Thursday’s 6-2 loss at No. 7 Auburn with an 8-6 Southeastern Conference victory over the Tigers. Scarlet McSwain was 3-for-3 with a home run, Gretchen Aucoin also homered and Tory Lewis from Chattanooga and Girls Preparatory School was 2-for-3 for the Lady Vols (27-8, 7-4) on Thursday, and those three and Shaliyah Geathers from East Hamilton all homered Friday. Lewis, whose homer was inside the park, was 2-for-3 again, and Geathers and McSwain hit three-run blasts. Auburn is 36-5, 9-2.
* Huntingdon beat Covenant College 2-0 and 12-7 in USA South softball Friday in Montgomery, Ala. Morgan Lane was 3-for-4 for Covenant (9-15, 2-12) in the first game, and Tyler Epes was 2-for-3 with an RBI and a run scored in the second game, when Madison Quirk had two hits and scored twice and Amanda English was 1-for-1 with two RBIs.
* Hendrix twice beat visiting Sewanee 17-1 in five innings in Southern Athletic Association softball Friday in Conway, Ark. Sewanee (0-16, 0-14), which gave up 14 first-inning runs in game two, got two hits in each game. Courtney Saunders had both RBIs for the Tigers.
Lacrosse
* Sewanee won the showdown of unbeaten SAA women’s lacrosse teams on Katie Riddle’s man-down goal with 20 seconds left in Friday’s home match against Rhodes. Riddle had six goals and two assists and Crawford Horan made 14 saves as the Tigers (13-0, 5-0) won 12-11, dropping the Lynx to 9-1, 4-1. Mallory Grimm and Relly King netted two goals each for Sewanee, King adding three assists, and Ellie Murphy had a goal and two assists. SAA scoring leader Kendall Cunningham had four goals and an assist for Rhodes.
Basketball
* Former Auburn star and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga assistant coach Gerald White will coach the Atlanta eighth-grade basketball standouts against the Chattanooga stars co-coached by all-time UTC leading scorer Wayne Golden in the “City of Champions” Middle School All-Star game today at 1 p.m. at McCallie School. Golden has come in from Austin, Texas, with his eighth-grade son for the second annual matchup against White’s teams. McCallie assistant Jonathan Adams is the other local co-coach. Admission costs $6, and all proceeds go to the Boys to Men program conducted by the Independent Youth Services Foundation, which is headed by Golden’s high school and UTC teammate Book McCray.