The Daily Southerner, Tarboro, NC

Sports

March 15, 2010

Lady Vikings come from behind to win thriller

For The Daily Southerner

On a very wet Friday afternoon, second year Coach Ricky Babb told his team they had to put the weather conditions out of their mind because both teams have to play in them. The Lady Vikings adhere to their coach’s advice until their final at bat with a dramatic 11 run in the seventh inning to defeat the visiting Lady Gryphons 19-18.

In the first inning, the Lady Vikings committed seven errors and gave up 10 unearned runs digging themselves into an early 10-0 deficit.

“We came out flat and played like we didn’t want to be out there early on,” Babb said.

Eventually the Lady Vikings would get a little life in the bottom of the second scoring four runs to close the gap 12-4 in the Lady Gryphons advantage. After a scoreless third and fourth inning by the Vikings, the Gryphons added two more runs holding a 14-4 advantage going into the bottom of the fifth inning.

The Lady Gryphons were chanting “Three up and three down and lets go home,” which gave the Vikings extra motivation to keep fighting. With one out, Sara Whitehurst hit a double scoring Naquavia Avent and Holly Modlin to cut the deficit 14-6 and they added 2 more runs making it 14-8.

The seventh inning turned out to be another error prone inning for the Vikings as they committed several miscues and the Gryphons scored four runs and led 18-8.

With the odds against them the Vikings trailed by 10 during their last at-bat.

“I told our girls one swing will not get us 10 runs, and these girls kept saying. were are not out of this,” Babb said. “As I was walking to the coach’s box, I already had in my mind what to say these young ladies about how we lost the game. I am very proud to say they proved me wrong.

“With one runner on base and one out down by 10 runs the Vikings slowly eased back in the game after two hits, five walks, and two rare errors by the Gryphons. With the bases loaded the Vikings trailed 18-15 and Kailyn Abrams at bat. Abrams nailed a base clearing triple that tied the game at 18-18,

Three pitches later Abrams scored on a passed ball to seal the Vikings’ dramatic come-from-behind victory 19-18.

“I am extremely proud for how hard these ladies fought back tonight, but we have got to play for seven complete innings game in game out.” Babb said..

The Vikings improved to 3-1 for the season and will begin conference play Tuesday when they travel to North Pitt.



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