Softball Playing for First League Title in Over 30 Years
It has been 31 years since a Stockbridge softball team has won a conference title and this Thursday that streak could end for the Panthers.
Stockbridge hosts Lakewood at 4:00 PM in a make-up game that will decide the GLAC title in a winner take all contest that would give the Panthers their first league title since 1988 when Stockbridge was still in the Ingham County League. Thirty-one long years, a majority of the parents of the players were still in high school or even middle school the last time the Panthers won a league title.
The Vikings enter the contest with a 13-1 league record while the Panthers are 12-2. The teams split a doubleheader earlier in the season for the Vikings lone loss, while the Panthers dropped game to Olivet.
With a win by Stockbridge, the teams will finish tied, but the Panthers will have won to three-game series to break the tie-breaker and clinch the league title.
The Panthers improved their overall record to 27-5 by winning three of four games last week.
They opened with a doubleheader sweep of Grass Lake.
The first game was a pitchers duel as the Panthers took the contest 2-1.
Paige Wooden drove in a run with an RBI groundout in the first and it would stay that way until the fourth when the Warriors scored an unearned run for a 1-1 tie.
Kaylie Sheppard was hit by a pitch to start the seventh and reached third after walks to Taylor Carey and Emily Breslin. She would score on a walk-off on a sacrifice fly by Wooden to pull out the win.
Wooden, Breslin, and Sheppard had the only hits for the Panthers. Breslin struckout 11 and allowed just two hits for the win.
The Panthers would score four runs in the fifth to pull away for a 7-3 win in the second game.
Breslin, Lena Jackson, Hannah Gutting, and Alexis Hightower had hits for the Panthers, with Gutting collecting two RBI. Breslin struckout even for the win.
The Panthers then blanked Haslett 10-0 in the opening round of the Lansing Hall of Fame Classic.
Breslin smacked a pair of home runs and drove in four to lead the Panthers bats. McKenzie Noble came off the bench to replace Carey, who was injured and smacked a home run and drove in three. Wooden added three hits, while Gutting had a hit and RBI.
The Panthers faced one of the top team in the state in the semifinals of the Lansing tournament and fell to D2 third-ranked Eaton Rapids 6-1.
They faced one of the top pitchers in the state in Grace Lehto and struggled to get the bats going, recording just two hits. Hightower and Katelyn Knieper collected the two hits for the Panthers.
