Columbus East’s Lola Watkins slides into home before Columbus North catcher Ali Wooten can apply the tag on a wild pitch in Wednesday’s East Central Sectional semifinal.
Rob Baker | For the Republic
ST. LEON — During its regular-season game with Columbus North back on April 21, Columbus East had a 3-1 lead after five innings, then pulled starting pitcher Baleigh Fish and watched as the Bull Dogs put up 11 runs in the sixth.
Needless to say, when the two rivals met again Wednesday in the semifinal round of the Class 4A sectional at East Central, Olympians coach Rusty Brummett kept Fish in the circle.
The sophomore right-hander made the decision look like a good one, tossing a three-hit shutout to lift East to a 3-0 triumph.
The Olympians (10-15) will play Whiteland, an 11-1 winner over Franklin in Wednesday’s second semifinal, in Thursday evening’s final, where East will attempt to win a sectional championship for the first time since capping a three-year run with a title back in 2004.
Fish struck out eight and worked deftly around a walk and a sixth-inning error, not allowing a Bull Dog runner to advance past second base all night. Only one North hitter reached over the final three frames.
“I had spent the last couple of days just preparing my arm for this,” Fish said. I was super excited and was a little bit nervous, but I am just overall so proud of everyone, because I would not have been able to do this without a great defense and a great bunch of hitters behind me.”
She was happy to earn some measure of revenge against North hurler Bailee Scruggs, who “hit a bomb off one of the drop curves I had thrown” in the team’s first meeting.
Scruggs was almost as strong as Fish throughout, scattering five hits without a walk and fanning seven, but the few baserunners she did allow proved costly.
East’s Lola Watkins led off the game with a hard infield single to third base, stole second and then came home when Fish dropped a one-out base hit into shallow right field.
The Bull Dogs (13-12) put two runners on in the bottom of the first, but Fish registered consecutive strikeouts to strand them and hold a 1-0 edge.
Watkins struck again in the third inning, hitting a fly ball to left that turned into a triple and then sliding safely into home on a passed ball to double the Olympians’ lead.
Scruggs retired the next nine hitters she faced before running into some trouble in the top of the sixth. Thaise Jessup doubled with one out, and Fish then lofted a fly to the warning track in left that fell out of the glove. Jessup was thrown out at the plate trying to score, but Fish advanced all the way to third on the play and another passed ball brought home courtesy runner Lilly Tindell, who was called safe on a close play at the plate.
The way Fish was throwing, three runs were more than enough.
“Baleigh was just tough tonight,” Brummett said. “She was getting on top early in most counts. I looked up and saw a lot of 0-2, 1-2 counts; that’s just crucial, because then they’re swinging at your pitches. And she did that top to bottom.”
Bull Dogs coach TJ Jarvis tipped her cap to Fish but felt his lineup could have handled her better, especially in their second and third times up to bat.
”We didn’t make any adjustments throughout the game,” he said. “We kind of went up there with the same approach, and if it didn’t work we just kept doing it for some reason. We talked about that all week, making adjustments in the box. Move up, move back, do something, right? And we just didn’t do that tonight.”
Next up for the Olympians is an opportunity to end a long sectional drought Thursday evening.
“We’ve talked about it a little bit, Brummett said. “It’s cliché, but we’re going to have fun. We’re going to enjoy this for a couple of hours, then we’ll come back tomorrow and take our swing at it.”
“It is such a huge thing,” Fish added. “I’m so excited to go out and play tomorrow and get the win.”
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