Gallery by Heather Belcher
Fairlea – That Josi Ervin, a player who hadn’t homered in two years, crushed one over the fence in centerfield perfectly summarized a successful evening for Greenbrier East.
The Lady Spartans struck out just once in 35 plate appearances while exploding for nine runs in a 9-5 win over George Washington in the Class AAA Region 3 Championship Wednesday in Fairlea.
With the win East takes a 1-0 advantage in the best-of-3 series which will continue Thursday at George Washington.
The plan was simple enough for East – put the ball in play over and over and force the Patriots to make plays on defense. The hosts executed it to perfection, with GW committing four errors, three of which led to runs.
“We faced them down there a few weeks ago and we kind of had the same situation,” East head coach Aaron Ambler said. “We had maybe three or four strikeouts and put it in play but we hit right at them. We knew we needed to do a better job staying back and hitting the ball a little harder at them. They’ve got a good defense but if you hit enough at them you’re going to find some gaps.”
The pendulum swung both ways with the Patriots capitalizing on a pair of East errors in the opening frame. After Ervin induced a flyout to open the game, GW’s next three batters reached base – two on errors – without a ball leaving the infield. The second miscue came on a ball hit by Nat Tomblin back to Ervin whose throw to first missed the mark, allowing Tylie Barton to score.
A quick meeting in the circle remedied the early jitters with Ervin getting a popout and groundout to strand a pair in scoring position.
It didn’t take long for the hosts to return the favor.
Taylor Boswell ignited the rally in the bottom of the inning when her two-out fly ball was dropped in centerfield. Lily Carola followed with a single, tying the game after an inning and previewing what was to come.
The tiebreaker came in the following frame when East took the lead, sending eight to the plate to aid the process. Gracie Gumm wore a pitch to put a leadoff man on for East and Hailey Ervin, batting in the No. 9 slot, scored her with a double down the third base line. One batter later Lindsay Black stroked an RBI single with two outs to plate the younger Ervin, eventually scoring on an error to make it 4-1 East.
The fourth and sixth innings yielded more of the same with Josi Ervin crushing her first home run of the year in the bottom of the fourth and Boswell scoring on an error at shortstop.
For good measure the Spartans added a trio of insurance runs in the bottom of the sixth, nearly invoking the mercy rule with a 9-2 advantage.
Meanwhile GW’s lethal lineup mustered just five hits across the first six frames, adding its second run on a Passion Holley RBI single in the top of the sixth.
The final frame proved harder to navigate for East.
GW sent seven batters to the plate with Alexis Adkins blasting a two-run home run, her 11th of the year, to spark the rally attempt. A trio of one-out hits followed but East secured its second out when Tomblin was tagged out between second and third, allowing Holley to score GW’s fifth and final run of the game.
East fended off further terror, inducing a flyout to escape into Thursday.
“Offensively we chased bad pitches and helped (Ervin),” GW head coach Stacey Hobbs said. “We didn’t play defense either. Alexis did fine. She created a lot ground balls and fly balls and we gave them a lot of unearned runs. And then we get to the seventh inning and we start mashing the ball. They were fortunate enough to get our biggest bat out today. Otherwise, anybody that knows softball knows that if we play defense that’s a different ball game. We’re not worried at all. Not even a little bit. We got their very best today and it almost wasn’t enough. We have all the confidence in the world in our girls … I don’t want to go too far and say it but I will, I think tomorrow’s a different story.”
For East it’s the second time the Lady Spartans have held a 1-0 advantage in the regional series in the career of this senior class. The Lady Spartans handed St. Albans its first loss of the year back in 2021 when they beat the Red Dragons in Game 1 of the regional series before dropping the next two.
They’re hoping to avoid that fate again and bust through to the state tournament in South Charleston next week, needing just one win to do so.
“We told them that were treating it like we lost today and tomorrow’s do or die,” Ambler said. “We didn’t finish anything tonight and we’re not really even looking at it as a victory. We’re going to play tomorrow looking for a win. If we win tomorrow we’ll celebrate then. If we win Friday we’ll celebrate then but right now we’re focused on the next day.”
Email: tylerjackson@lootpress.com and follow on Twitter @tjack94
