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By Carey Reeder | Managing Editor

A pair of Red Devils in Maplesville and Verbena High Schools were among the first state finalist teams to take the field at Choccolocco Park in Oxford this week in the Class 1A State Softball Tournament on May 14.

Maplesville took on Spring Garden High School in the first round, and after a Kamylia Talley single in the first inning, she scored on a ground out later in the inning to put them up 1-0. The score stood there until the fourth inning when Spring Garden took a 2-1 lead with a pair of runs in the top half of the inning. Talley was 2-for-2 at the plate.

Maplesville quickly responded in the bottom half as Talley led the inning off with a double, followed by a single from Jaden McGee to put runners on second and third base. Hannah Crowe stepped to plate and plated both runs with a two-RBI double to take the lead back for Maplesville at 3-2. Crowe was 2-for-3 in the game.

In the fifth inning, Spring Garden got to the Red Devils starter Mollie Kayte Smith for three runs to take the lead and hold on for the round-one win. Two of the five runs Smith surrendered were unearned, and she had four strikeouts in her seven innings in the circle.

Verbena faced off with Skyline High School in their first-round matchup, and the Red Devils settled in after a Skyline run in the first inning. That was until Skyline pushed across eight runs across the fourth, fifth and sixth innings and capitalized on six Verbena errors in the game.

The Red Devils did get on the board in the sixth inning after a Mia Schuffert single, a Kiara Ray walk and a Jaycee Quinn single loaded the bases for Lakeyn Mims, and Mims earned a walk to score Verbena’s only run in their 9-1 first-round loss. Quinn was 2-for-3 with a pair of singles to lead the team at the plate.

In the elimination bracket, Verbena drew Waterloo High School and had their offense sputter with just four hits, all singles, in the 16-1 loss to end their season. Schuffert’s RBI single in the fourth inning was the run producing at bat for the Red Devils. Her single was paired with Mims’ single and Ray’s pair of one-bag knocks.

In Maplesville’s elimination-bracket game, they too found their offense stalling out with just two hits against Hackleburg High School. One of those hits came in the first inning as McGee roped an RBI triple that scored Talley after she was hit by a pitch the at bat before. The Red Devils’ next hit did not come until the top of the fourth inning when McGee singled to left field, giving her both hits for Maplesville in the 12-2 loss. The other run was scored later in the fourth inning following an error by Hackleburg.