18 hours Ago By Laurinburg Exchange
LAURINBURG —The Lady Scots softball team picked up a 4-1 victory over the Latta Vikings on Wednesday night at Scotland High School. The Scots improve to 13-1 on the season with their 12th win in a row while the Vikings fall to 10-3 with the loss. Head Coach Adam Romaine was recognized prior to the game for passing 100 career wins as Scotland’s head coach, a milestone he reached in their win over South View last week (he is now at 103 career wins).
The first 2.5 innings of the game were rather uneventful as the teams combined for one hit (single from Maddie Berry in the top of the first) and two base runners (Addison Lewis would reach safely in the bottom of the second on a Latta fielding error). The Scots would then get on the board first in their half of the third as Marissa Smith would get the train going with a single and advancing to second on a Vikings error.
Smith then stole third and scored on a wild pitch to give Scotland a 1-0 lead. The Scots would successfully add to their advantage one inning later. Avery Stutts led off the frame with an infield single before being lifted for a courtesy runner in Khloe Radford.
Radford would steal second, advance to third on a passed ball and score on a ground ball from Kinsey Hamilton that was hit to the pitcher and resulted in another error. Latta was able to get a run back in the top of the fifth as Paisley Jackson would hit a solo homer off of Stutts to cut Scotland’s lead in half. The Scots immediately added back onto their lead with two runs in their half of the fifth.
Emily Sampson led off the inning by reaching on a fielding error before Addison Ratley and Smith both drew walks to load the bases with no outs. Addison Johnson then drove in Sampson with an RBI single while Smith would steal third and score on the same play thanks to the throw being mishandled and getting to the outfield. Lewis and Hamilton would each add singles in the bottom of the sixth but the Scots wouldn’t add any more runs.
The Vikings would go down in order in both the sixth and seventh frames. Johnson had Scotland’s lone RBI in the game while going 1-3 from the plate. Stutts, Lewis, Hamilton and Smith had one hit apiece.
Romaine liked the way the Scots adjusted to Berry as they went through the batting order multiple times. He admitted that Berry’s velocity was a big change compared to what the team has seen lately and was pleased with how they put the ball in play with frequency even if they did benefit from seven Latta errors. The Scots stole seven bases, which was also a point of emphasis on offense.
“When you put the ball in play, things will happen,” Romaine said. “They helped us with some errors but we found some holes and put some balls in play. We did some aggressive base running tonight, we’ve talked about that lately, put some pressure on a defense and we did well with that tonight.
” Stutts pitched all seven innings and allowed one run and three hits while striking out 10 batters. She threw 81 pitches (65 strikes) to the 24 batters she faced. Even though an opponent scored a run against the Scots for the first time since March 17 against South Brunswick, Romaine is incredibly confident in how Stutts has been pitching all season.
If Scotland’s offense is able to produce multiple runs in a contest, he doesn’t feel like the Scots can be beat. “We tell the girls if we put five runs up I don’t think anybody can beat us,” Romaine said. “With our defense and Avery pushing like she is, I feel that confident and the girls do also.
” The Scots will return to conference play on Friday night when they host Union Pines at 7 p.m. Scotland took the first meeting in Cameron back on March 11 by a score of 9-0.
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