Lady Lions statebound

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

— Gravette’s Lady Lions, No. 1 seed in the 4A north regional softball tournament, didn’t panic last Friday when No. 4 seed Dardanelle tied the game three times before Gravette pulled out the 7-6 victory in the bottom of the seventh.

The win punched the Lions’ ticket to the state tournament, even though they lost a heartbreaker 5-4 decision to Mena last Tuesday at regionals held in Harrison.

In the Dardanelle game,Kendra Meeker (2-for-3) legged out an infield single to open the frame and eventually scored on sacrifice bunts from Meagan Ward and Destaney Wishon to take the win.

Shyanne Nichols picked up the win for Gravette (18-4), working two scoreless innings of relief. She also went 2-for-3 at the plate after two innings but, after trailing 4-2, scored two in the bottom of the seventh to send the game into overtime.

Six Gravette errors helped the Mena Bearcats pick up a 5-4 victory on May 5.

Headed to State

Monday, the Lady Lions dropped a 5-3 heartbreaker to the Farmington girls in the battle for third place in Regionals at Harrison. Farmington got revenge for the loss the Lady Lions gave them as Gravette took the 4A-1 Conference Tournament title last week with a win over the favored Washington County team.

But it’s on to the 4A state tournament at Nashville for the Lady Lions. They will play Thursday, at 2:30 p.m., as coach Taos Jones’ girls get “fired up” for their second consecutive trip to state.

Sports, Pages 9 on 05/09/2012