RICHLAND — The loss was tough enough. It hurt more because there were some self-inflicted wounds.
Still, the La Center Wildcats managed to rebound from falling in the Class 1A state softball quarterfinals, and they are still in the hunt for third place.
La Center beat Connell 5-2 on Friday morning, lost to Seattle Christian 4-2 in the quarterfinals, and finished the long day by rallying for a 7-6 victory over Mount Baker in the consolation bracket. La Center has to win two games Saturday to advance to the third-place game.
Abby England hit a walk-off single in the bottom of the seventh against Mount Baker as La Center rallied from three runs down and then two runs down in the elimination game.
England credited the spirited rally caps. Not just any caps. Was that a chicken? A cat mask? A football helmet?
“We were made to wear them,” England said.
Not forced to wear them. They were born to wear them, if you know what she means.
“We put them on every inning just to remind ourselves to step up and pick each other up,” England said.
England went 3 for 4 in the final game of the day and drove in four runs. Kayla Aguirre was 4 for 4 and got the hit and stolen base in the seventh inning to get in scoring position for England.
The Wildcats celebrated just a couple hours after being devastated.
La Center had something going in the bottom of the seventh against Seattle Christian until a strange out occurred at home plate. Pinch hitter Maddie Stimmel blasted a double that appeared to drive in a run easily. However, the La Center base runner was ruled not to have touched the plate. Seattle Christian, long after the play was seemingly over, threw the ball to the catcher and an out was recorded.
Instead of it being 4-3 with no outs and a runner on second, it was back to 4-2 with one out.
“That’s going to kill you,” La Center coach Randy Martinez said. “We had the tying run at second base.”
It fit the rest of the game, too, Martinez said.
“Every break that could possibly happen, happened to them,” Martinez said. “They had some seeing-eye hits, and we made some mistakes, and they capitalized.”
In the opener, La Center never trailed in a 5-2 win over Connell. Charlotte Royal and Megan Muffett drove in runs in that game, and Lilly Casey had a triple.
That was La Center’s first appearance at the state tournament since 2008.
Long after the day started, the Wildcats earned the right to prolong their stay at the 2015 state tournament.
