Irvin shines with six RBIs, two Ws as Sweet Water wins Area 1
Sweet Water (19-17) won the Class 1A, Area 1 championship Monday with a pair of victories over Millry in the area tournament.
Sweet Water 9, Millry 8
Game one amounted to a back-and-forth, error-plagued affair that required late-inning heroics for Sweet Water to pull out a 9-8 win in eight innings.
Millry doubled a run home in the top of the first inning and held the 1-0 lead until the Bulldogs hung a four spot in the bottom of the third. Eva Myers singled and scored two batters later on a Sara Irvin double to tie the game. Irvin later scored on a two-out error to put Sweet Water up 2-1. Natalie Luker followed with a two-run homer to move the advantage to 4-1.
Millry used a walk, three errors and one hit in the top of the fourth to cut the deficit to 4-3. Sweet Water did not rest on its laurels as it took one of those runs back in the bottom of the fourth when Kora Myers capitalized on a Millry error by scoring on a passed ball for the 5-3 lead.
An error, a hit-by-pitch and a walk loaded the bases with nobody out in the top of the fifth. A single and another error plated three runs to give Millry the 6-5 lead. Millry later got a two-out hit in the top of the sixth to move the advantage to 8-5.
Sweet Water got the bats moving in the bottom of the frame as Kayla Marshall led off with a single. Marshall stole second and scored on an error that allowed Kora Myers to reach. Eva Myers singled and Elaina Mitchell reached on an error to load the bases. Irvin followed with a sacrifice fly to left to cut the score to 8-7.
Irvin shut Millry down in order in the seventh including a pair of strikeouts to keep the deficit at one run. Luker opened the home half with a single before Lindsay Davis reached on an error. Marshall singled in Luker to tie the game with no outs in the inning. Millry slammed the door by retiring the next three batters to send the game to the eighth inning at 8-8.
Irvin pitched around a two-out hit in the top of the frame to give her team a chance with the score still tied in the bottom half. Irvin then drew a leadoff walk ahead of Kamae Retic reaching on an error and Lara Little being hit by a pitch to load the bases. Luker singled home Irvin for the walk-off game winner.
Luker finished the game 3-for-5 with a homer, three RBIs and two runs scored to lead the offense. Irvin got the the win after allowing one hit and now walks over two and a third innings of relief.
Sweet Water 10, Millry 1
Sweet Water shellacked Millry 10-1 in the second game. The Bulldogs scored two runs in each of the first, second and fourth innings before adding three more in the fifth and one in the seventh.
Irvin reached on an error to open the game and made it all the way around the bases two batters later when Little hit a two-run shot for the 2-0 lead. Irvin doubled in Kora Myers and BreAnna Ramsey in the second to move it to a 4-0 lead.
Irvin doubled in Marshall and Eva Myers in the fourth for the 6-0 advantage. Davis tripled in Little for the 7-0 margin in the fifth. Maggie Thompson took a bases-loaded walk to make it 8-0 before Harley Loper hit a sacrifice fly to center to plate Marshall and move it to 9-0. Retic’s seventh-inning grounder drove home Kora Myers for the final Sweet Water run of the game.
Millry managed to erase the shutout thanks to an error, a passed ball and a single in the bottom of the seventh.
Irvin was dominant for all seven innings, striking out nine batters while scattering two hits and allowing one unearned run. She also drove in four runs with a pair of doubles.
Sweet Water (19-17) advances to play in the Class 1A South Regional in Gulf Shores next week.