PREP SOFTBALL: Bats fail Draft, fall to Bees

STUARTS DRAFT — Facing the Seminole District’s Pitcher of the Year was bad enough for the upstart Stuarts Draft softball team.

Committing two first-inning errors to spot Brookville’s Nicole Defilippo a 3-0 lead before she even sniffed the circle was worse.

The bats falling asleep? That just sealed the Cougars’ fate as they could only muster three hits en route to a 7-1 loss to the Bees in the Region III quarterfinal round.

“[The bats] never really came around for us,” said Draft coach Michelle Campbell. “You can’t win a game with [three hits.]”

The Bees, the Seminole District regular season co-champions, did all the damage they would need in the first inning, with Tabatha Maddox touching home off a Sarah Truxell triple to the wall in right center and Truxell scoring when a hard shot back toward the mound by Jessica Pleasants glanced off Draft starter Lauren Campbell’s glove and rolled into center field. They would add one more in the opening frame.

Then Defilippo went to work.

The senior struck out seven Cougars in the game and retired nine of the first 11 batters she faced. Her lone blemish came in the second when Draft’s Ariel Christy reached base on a throwing error and advanced to third on back-to-back passed balls. She scored on a Katie Yancey ground out to third. Draft wouldn’t touch home again.

“We knew we had to come up here and put runs on the board early,” said Bees coach Gary Ferguson. “And then [Defilippo] came out and did a good job.”

After a mistake-filled first, the Cougars settled down defensively and Lauren Campbell followed suit, blanking the Bees two straight innings before an Amber Harvey ground out plated Hope Johnson in the fourth and Defilippo helped herself with a two-run double to the fence in center to build her lead to 6-1 in the fifth.

“It’s my senior year,” Defilippo said, “and if we lose, we’re out, and we have to give it everything we got. We can’t leave anything on the table.”

The Cougars, however, left plenty of runners on base as Defilippo worked herself out of jams in the fourth and fifth innings.

In the fourth, the Cougars’ Cadie Loan reached when her blooper fell in front of Maddox in center and looked to have a rally going when Christy reached on a bunt, but Loan overran second base and was tagged out.

In the fifth, Lauren Campbell reached base with a single and an error put Brittany Wright on first with nobody out. But Defilippo induced Morgan Holbert into a bloop out and got Emmy Blacka to pop out before whiffing Loan with a fastball.

It was the last time the Cougars threatened.

“We struggled with the bats,” said Michelle Campbell. “It seems like we got something started, then we’d get an out and it just falls off after that.”

With a young team returning most of its key players, the Cougars have already set their sights on next season. The goal is a simple one, according to freshman Lauren Campbell, who got her first taste of regional play.

“To get farther in regionals, hopefully,” she said. “And become a better team and hit the ball better.”

They could have used the latter Monday.