Lady Vikings Put Up Fight Before Losing To Fairfield
Posted
Mark Howe-mhowe@timesuniononline.com
LAGRANGE – Not a lot of people gave Tippecanoe Valley a fighting chance of winning its first-round softball sectional matchup with Fairfield on Monday. The Lady Vikings did fight, and had a chance to put a scare into the Lady Falcons but fell 6-2 in the Lakeland Sectional. Valley left six runners on base in the first three innings, and after loading the bases in the top of the third Fairfield pitcher Lairen Miller retired the next eight Valley hitters. Meanwhile, the door cracked open only a little for Fairfield, but it was enough. Fairfield used a single and stolen base from Jalisa Schwartz, and a single from Mikala Wallace to open the scoring in the second. Julia Brown added a wind-aided home run in the third to stake the Lady Falcons to a 2-0 lead. The gap doubled when the Fairfield scored two runs on a trio of Valley errors in the fifth. Valley answered when a Fairfield error allowed Amanda Shepherd and Kaitlyn Ott to score. Fairfield got those runs back in the bottom of the inning, and that was it for Valley. Kassidy Shepherd pitched well enough for Valley, going six innings and allowing eight hits and walking one while striking out three. While the loss closes a 4-18 season for Valley, head coach Daryl Shoemaker was impressed with his team’s effort, and felt like the players peaked going in to the sectional. “I’m very impressed with our girls. We got a few base-runners and had a chance to get some runs early. If we can get runners on, then get some good at-bats, then we can beat teams like (Fairfield),” he said. “They did a real good job of trying to do that; they played really hard. Kassidy pitched a good game. We put it all together at the right time of the year.” With only Kassidy Shepherd and catcher Darian Dotson graduating this year, Shoemaker feels this year’s squad left a firm foundation to build on for the 2016 campaign. “We’ve been giving them the philosophy, so to speak, of what we want them to do, and how we want to play ball. Finishing strong for the ones that are coming back, that have been playing and know how we are now, it’ll help going into next year as we keep building the program.” Fairfield, now 15-6, moves on to face Wawasee in the first semifinal at 5 p.m. today. The Lady Warriors had a bye into the semis.
FAIRFIELD 6 TIPPECANOE VALLEY 2 TV 000 002 0 – 2 7 7 F 011 022 x – 6 8 1 Valley – K. Shepherd (L, 61P, 8H, 6R, 3ER, 1BB, 3K) Fairfield – L. Miller (W, 7IP, 7H, 2R, 1R, 1BB, 10K) 2B – Brown (F), Ott (TV) HR – Brown (F) Records: Valley 4-18, Fairfield 15-6
