Sale Creek cruises past CSAS in District 4-A softball

Sale Creek's Allison Smith slides into second base as a throw goes wide past Arts & Sciences shortstop Jade Hester during their softball game Tuesday at Warner Park. Sale Creek won 14-1.
Sale Creek's Allison Smith slides into second base as a throw goes wide past Arts & Sciences shortstop Jade Hester during their softball game Tuesday at Warner Park. Sale Creek won 14-1.

With a roster that's finally healthy for the first time this season, Sale Creek's softball team is ready now to put a hurting on everyone it faces.

Coming off a tough stretch that included five straight losses while five starters missed games for a variety of injuries, the Lady Panthers were impressive Tuesday in a 14-1 win over Arts & Sciences at Warner Park that sealed the District 4-A regular-season title.

"It's hard for any team to win games with that many starters out for a while, but especially for a small school," Lady Panthers coach Clifford Kirk said. "We've got them back at just the right time, and now we've got some potential.

"We needed a game like this. We've been real up and down and just not playing very good at times, but we started looking better in our last four games and then today we really jumped out on them."

The Lady Panthers (22-7) pushed six runs across in the first inning and added to their lead with at least one run in each following inning.

The quick start was more than enough to ease any lingering nerves for senior Macie Stanfield, one of the Lady Panthers who had missed a significant number of games. She scattered six hits and struck out eight to earn the pitching win and also was 3-for-4 at the plate with two RBIs.

She worked herself out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the third inning, coaxing a grounder back to her, an infield flyout and a strikeout to prevent CSAS from closing the gap.

"That was really big to get that much support early," Stanfield said. "Honestly, today wasn't my strongest game. I didn't have my best pitches working, so I had to resort to my changeup a lot, but the whole team really had my back out there.

"They were in my head in that third inning, but I was able to just clear my mind and go after one batter at a time. Keeping them from scoring there was really big."

Allison Smith was 3-for-3 with five RBIs for the Lady Panthers, and Hannah Hall went 2-for-2 with two RBIs. Madeline Gentry, Kristen Sharp, Shelby Sullivan and Madison Stott also had at least one RBI as Sale Creek pounded out 17 total hits.

With the start of the postseason looming next week, Sale Creek, which brings back all but one starter from last year's Class A runner-up team, once again has a lineup focused on chasing the program's first state championship.

"When Macie had the bases loaded, she said maybe she should come out since she didn't have her best stuff out there," Kirk said. "But I told her she got herself into it and she was going to get herself out. And that's just what she did. That should give her some more confidence the next time she's in a jam that she can work out of it.

"Those are the situations that hopefully we can learn from and will make us tougher down the stretch. We should be fine from here on, so long as we stay healthy."

Contact Stephen Hargis at shargis@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6293. Follow him on Twitter @StephenHargis.

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