By By Robby Atkinson / staff writer
March 26, 2004
The Meridian Community College Lady Eagles started the season on a dreadful 17-game losing streak, but all of sudden, the Lady Eagles have won three straight games.
MCC took a 5-4 win over Wallace-Hanceville on Tuesday and that momentum carried right over into Thursday night at Northeast Park. The Lady Eagles scored a thrilling 7-6 win in eight innings and took a 10-2 victory in game two to secure the doubleheader sweep over Shelton State.
MCC will open conference action Tuesday at home against East Mississippi at 1 p.m.
MCC 7
Shelton 6
The Lady Eagles scored the game winning run in the bottom of the eighth to take the exciting one-run win in game one.
The run scored on an error in right field by the Lady Bucs that proved to be the difference.
MCC (3-18) jumped out on top by a score of 1-0 in the first inning thanks to some more careless mistakes by Shelton. Sheena Evans led the first inning off by reaching on a throwing error and later scored on a single from Courtney Gray that gave MCC a 1-0 lead.
Shelton fought back to take a 2-1 lead with back-to-back walks with the bases loaded by MCC pitcher Stephanie Choo. The Lady Eagles took a 3-2 lead in the third inning behind a pair of brilliant bunt singles.
Gray led off with a bunt single and Raleigh Odom followed with a bunt single of her own that led to the next two runs for MCC. The first run crossed the plate on an error at first base and the second run scored on an RBI single from Jor'Dan Orr that gave the Lady Eagles a one-run lead.
The Lady Bucs battled back to regain the lead on a two-run single by pitcher Hannah Jones to give Shelton a 4-3 edge.
MCC continued to find ways to score as Odom delivered an RBI single that drove in one run to tie the game at 4-4. A second run scored in the inning due to Shelton's third error of the day.
Shelton forced extra innings with a run in the seventh off a sacrifice fly to center field by Jones to tie the game at 5-5. The Lady Bucs looked to cruise to the win with a run in the eighth inning on a fielder's choice by Ashley Whitmire to give the Lady Bucs a 6-5 lead, but MCC would have the last laugh.
Both runs in the bottom of the eighth scored on errors by the Lady Bucs that left the door open for the MCC win.
Choo (2-14) pitched the distance for the win and Jones suffered the loss for Shelton. Jones did collect 10 strikeouts.
MCC 10
Shelton 2
MCC scored five runs in the fourth inning that led to an eight-run win in game two. The Lady Eagles scored the first run of the game in the first inning on a single from Gray.
Shelton took a brief lead at 2-1 in the second inning on a two-run single by Kristi Ethridge. MCC took the lead for good in the second inning on a two-run double by Odom and Katie Barnett followed with an RBI single to make the score 4-2 in favor of MCC.
The Lady Eagles sealed the win with five runs in the fourth with one run scoring on a solo home run by Gray. Odom and Barnett both had RBI doubles in the inning, and Kirby Shelby also added a two-run triple.