Determining the top seed in the 13th District baseball tournament appears to be headed for a tiebreaker between Logan County and Franklin-Simpson. Meanwhile the Lady Cougars have sealed the top seed in the district softball tournament.
Wildcat catcher Jacob Curtis singled in Rylan Thomas with two outs in the 10th inning Tuesday in Franklin to give F-S and 3-2 victory.
The Cougars had won the first game of the season against Franklin-Simpson earlier. Each team now has just one district loss, and neither Russellville nor Todd Central has been able to challenge either of the leaders.
Over in Elkton, eighth grader Shelby Gettings pitched the Lady Cougars to a 14-0 shutout of Todd Central. Coach Mark Wood’s team stroked 22 hits in running its district record to 5-0. Russellville and Franklin are each 2-3 and Todd 1-4.
Lady Cougars 14, Todd 0
KJ Page, Brea Croslin, Lee, Kennedy Nichols, Paige Vanzant and Gettings each had three hits at Elkton. Abby Canler and Rosie Kerchenski added two each. Lee recorded five RBIs while Canler, Kerchenski and Gettings all drove in two runs.
Page scored three runs with Croslin, Shaina Johnson and Hailey Collins each crossing the plate twice. .
Gettings pitched the shutout while allowing seven hits and three walks. Michaela Robertson led Todd with two hits while Addy Sawyers, Jordan Weathers, Emma Harris, Samantha Case and Paige Rager each got a hit.
The Lady Rebels managed only three walks off Gettings, and each one of them was by Rachel Bilyeu.
Haley Vass went the distance on the mound for Todd.
F-S 3, Cougars 2
Outstanding pitching dominated the baseball game. The starters—Koby Wall of Logan County and Cole Heinze of Franklin—pitched well enough to win, and reliever Riley Ferguson of LCHS was much better than the loss beside his name. Wall gave up just one run on three hits and two walks in five innings. The Cougars trailed 1-0 when he relinquished the mound to Ferguson to start the sixth.
Logan took the lead in the top of the sixth. Bradley Taylor was hit by a pitch to lead off the inning. After Kaleb Justice walked, Wall singled to load the bases. Third Bell forced Taylor at the plate, but Braxton Meguiar singled in Justice with the tying run. Parker White worked a walk, getting an RBI as Wall crossed the plate with the go-ahead run. The bases were still loaded, but reliever Matthew Crittenden induced a force out at home to end the threat.
Ferguson, who had been ticketed for the Franklin junior varsity team before moving to Logan County to live with his grandparents—the Jim Fergusons, got this former teammates out without damage in the sixth inning.
In the seventh, however, Wildcat sub Alex Gilbert picked up the first of four walks off Ferguson in the inning. Clay Spears and Donovan Alderson also walked to load the bases. The Cougars were one out away from winning, but Hunter Crafton drew the walk to bring home Gilbert and send the contest into extra innings.
The game went another two and a half scoreless innings before Thomas singled with one out. He moved to second on winning reliever Dalton Fiveash’s groundout, and then raced home on Curtis’ walk-off hit.
Two long-time classmates, sophomores White and Meguiar, drove in a run each for Logan. Meguiar was the offensive star. He singled, doubled and walked to go along with the RBI.