Freshman's single lifts James Wood to softball win over Skyline

By MARK SAWYER | Special to The Winchester Star

WINCHESTER — In winning its first 14 games of the season, the James Wood High School softball team faced very little, if any adversity.

However as the season has drawn on, injuries have set in and those 14 straight wins created a huge target on the Colonels’ backs.

In the last 11/2 weeks, Wood had lost three of its previous four games, including two straight one-run losses.

The regular-season home finale had many story lines — three seniors playing on Senior Night, the Colonels trying to avoid a three-game losing streak and Wood hosting Northwestern District rival Skyline with first place in the standings on the line.

While it was Senior Night, a freshman outfielder stole the show. With two outs in the bottom of the sixth inning, right fielder Afton Sykes lined an RBI single to right to rally the Colonels to a 3-2 victory over the Hawks at Ridge Field.

“This is a big win for the seniors on Senior Night,” James Wood coach Todd Baker said. “The game itself didn’t really mean much as far as conference standings or anything but it’s always nice to beat the local teams. They’re always well coached and they’ve got a lot of athletes over there.

“We’ve got some girls banged up but we were able to hang in there,” Baker added. “We did the little things to win a game and we haven’t been doing that the last couple of weeks. It was a refuse to lose mentality tonight, not saying we couldn’t have been beat but we weren’t going to quit.”

The Colonels (16-3, 6-1 district) have already locked up the No. 2 two seed and a first round bye in next week’s Conference 21 West Tournament. They can wrap up the outright Northwestern District title with a win over Handley on Monday.

Wood had to manufacture the winning run in the bottom of the sixth. Pitcher Lauren King started the winning rally by getting hit by a pitch to lead off the inning. Courtesy runner Mackenzie McCarty moved to third on a pair of ground outs setting the stage for Sykes.

In a similar situation with one out and the bases loaded in the fourth inning, Sykes’ slow roller resulted in a force out at the plate leaving the Colonels down 2-1.

In the sixth, Sykes wiped the memory of the previous at-bats out of her mind and lined a single to right scoring McCarty and giving Wood a 3-2 advantage.

“I was just really pumped to be out there and I’m super happy that I came through,” Sykes said. “I knew the lights were bright and it was time to do it. I was like, ‘This has happened like three other times this season and I haven’t come through so this was the time to do it.’ I’m just super excited and happy.”

King took care of the rest and retired the Hawks in order in the seventh to secure the win. In fact, King retired 11 of the last 13 hitters she faced in tossing a five-hitter. She allowed two runs, struck out five and walked one.

The Colonels jumped out to the lead in the first inning thanks in part to one of their seniors. With one out, second baseman Alyssa Brown rocketed a double off the fence in center. She moved to third on a groundout and scored on King’s RBI single.

King made that stand up until the fourth as Skyline (11-3, 4-3 district) scored a pair to grab the lead. Center fielder Jessica Simms led off with a walk and one out later was trotting around the bases when catcher Rachael Sirbaugh got a hold of a 3-1 fastball and drove it over the left field fence for a two-run home run.

Wood tied it in the bottom of the inning. First baseman Lani Spielman reached on an error, then King and Camryn Rizzari both laced singles to load the bases with no outs. The next two hitters both hit grounders that resulted in force outs at the plate, but third baseman Haley Kaiser came to the rescue and ripped a single to left scoring Rizzari.

All three of James Wood’s runs scored thanks to two-out RBIs, something they’ve lacked lately. The Colonels outhit Skyline 6-5.

King helped herself by going 2 for 2 and reaching base all three plate appearances. Valerie Martin was 2 for 3 for the Hawks.

Ending the two-game skid was big for the Colonels, who finish up the regular season on Monday at Handley.

“This was an important win for our confidence,” Sykes said. “I think this shows that we’re back in it and give us that confidence boost heading into the conference tournament.”

“You don’t want to lose a couple, three games going right into the tournament,” Baker added. “You’ve got to go into it hot and I think we might be going the right direction now.”