Heartbreaking losses give Jags runner-up finish at state tourney
MONTGOMERY – The movie was fun to watch, but there was no happy ending on Thursday.
After winning the first three games of the Class 7A state tournament, the Spain Park High School softball team suffered a pair of heartbreaking losses to Fairhope on Thursday evening in the championship series.
Fairhope defeated the Jags, 7-5 and 8-6, in consecutive games to win the title, two of four games the Pirates won on the final day of the tournament.
The Jags won both games on Wednesday to open the state tournament and advanced to the championship game with a 14-0 thrashing of Smiths Station on Thursday morning.
“I’m very proud of this team,” said Spain Park head coach CJ Hawkins. “They exceeded a lot of expectations and there were a lot of doubters. They believed in each other and they represented our school well.”
Spain Park was in the driver’s seat in the first game against Fairhope, but the Pirates rallied for four runs in the seventh inning to turn a two-run deficit into a two-run victory.
“A couple plays here and there in that first game and it’s a different story,” Hawkins said.
In the second game, Fairhope scored four runs in the first inning and held on despite a seventh-inning surge from Spain Park.
“For a lot of these kids, it was their first time (playing at state),” Hawkins said. “Kids stepped up and produced all year long in clutch situations. Everybody had their moment.”
In the first game of the day, against Smiths Station, the Jags put the first seven runners of the game aboard and scored six runs to set the tone. Bailey Bowers drove in four runs in the game and Caroline Wooley capped off the offensive outburst with a grand slam in the sixth inning.
Annabelle Widra struck out 24 hitters over two games on Wednesday, and began Thursday by allowing just one hit and striking out nine in six innings.
In the first Fairhope game, the Pirates used back-to-back solo home runs to strike first and take a 3-0 lead after an inning. Wooley doubled in a run and Taylor Harrington knocked in two with a single to tie the game at 3-3 in the fourth inning. The Jags took a 4-3 lead on Maddie Majors’ RBI groundout.
Spain Park added a run in the sixth but Fairhope, down to its final two outs, scored four runs to take the win.
The Jags scored first in the second game against Fairhope on an Alexis Anderson single, but Fairhope immediately responded with a big bottom half of the first to take hold of a 4-1 lead. Harrington’s RBI groundout in the fourth cut the deficit to 4-2.
Kate Campbell came on to relieve Widra in the second inning and steadied the ship immediately. Campbell was electric, striking out the side in each of her first two innings. Fairhope scored four insurance runs in the sixth, but Campbell struck out nine over the final five innings.
“They’re warriors,” Hawkins said of her pitchers. “They were ready, prepared and competed.”
The Jags refused to go quietly despite being down 8-2 entering the final frame. A run scored as Anderson reached on an error, Wooley drove in a run with a single and Harrington and Majors each walked in a run, but the comeback attempt fell just shy.
Bowers, Anderson, Widra and Majors made the all-tournament team, as the Jags finished as the state runner-up for the second time in the last three seasons.
There were no seniors the Spain Park team, which finished 41-11 on the season, leaving the potential that the Jags return to the same stage with largely the same team next year.
The Jags can only hope the sequel will have a better ending.