“Our girls played hard,” Fayetteville head coach Chris Sherbert said.
“I was disappointed in how we played in the first game. We had nine errors and we couldn’t hit. The girls strapped it up and fought. Two great things happened — we finally got past Wadley and we are going to Montgomery.”
The Lady Wolves take on the winner from the North Regional Tournament Thursday at 9 a.m. at Lagoon Park.
“I am proud of these girls,” Sherbert said. “The bar has been raised and it is a great feeling to know that their hard work has paid off. We are down to the final eight. To be honest with you, I didn’t see it. I saw an opportunity before we went, but after we got defeated in that first game I didn’t see it. The girls took ownership, they would meet before the games and they would talk. I have no idea what they were talking about. We allowed them to go on their own. I let them motivate themselves and I finally saw some leadership from our girls. It is a great feeling. The girls are excited and they earned it, they deserved and they worked hard. I am proud of every one of them.”
In the first game of the tournament, Fayetteville fell to Maplesville 6-0.
The Lady Wolves were able to stay alive in double elimination tournament with a convincing 16-1 win over Loachapoka.
Going into the tournament the Lady Wolves wanted a chance to avenge their three losses to Wadley in the regular season and they did. Fayetteville won the game 12-7 in the final game on Friday.
Mandolin Parrett earned the win from the circle for Fayetteville. With the Lady Wolves season on the brink the senior asked for the ball and put together a stellar outing.
“I was going to start my eighth grader, because as the season went my eighth grader had a better outing against Wadley throughout the year,” Sherbert said. “Mandolin came up to me and said, ‘Coach I am not trying to tell you what to do, but coach I am ready, let me do it.’ I had my reservations about it, but I said you are a senior let me think about it. I called her back over and I said if I put you in don’t put so much pressure on yourself. Don’t think you have to throw a strike every play, just go out there and do your best. She pitched lights out. After the game I came over and gave her a hug and I said thank you for talking me into that. She did a great job. She was definitely the MVP of that game.”
The Lady Wolves recorded 10 hits and that is the most hits that they have recorded against their rivals.
Haley Haynes went 3-for-4 from the plate.
After finishing their game up at 1:30 in the morning, Fayetteville returned to the field nine and a half hours later to take on Verbena.
The momentum they had from defeating Wadley carried over as they defeated Verbena 9-7.
“We gave up a good game and a good fight,” Sherbert said. “We got up on them 6-0. They battled back and fought hard, but we ended up winning the game 9-7.”
Eighth grader Hayden Hughes earned the win out of the circle. Parrett earned the save for Fayetteville.
The Lady Wolves topped Jefferson Christian Academy 3-1. JCA lost to Maplesville to get into the loser bracket.
“It was a good defensive ball game,” he said. “Neither of us hit the cover off of the ball. We defeated them 3-1.
Hughes earned the win for Fayetteville.
With the win Fayetteville earned a berth in the Class 1A state softball tournament.
In the Class 1A Central Regional championship games they Lady Wolves ran out of energy and fell to Maplesville 17-7.
Sherbert said it took his team a long time to regain their focus after earning a berth into the state tournament.
“We were really excited and it took a while for us to get down from that,” he said. “We had to play back-to-back, back –to- back. They were entering the game playing their fourth game and we were playing our sixth, so were pretty whipped. They jumped on us 4-0. We scored six runs in the bottom of that inning. You have to give Maplesville credit they played well and they hit the ball. We made some plays and we missed some of them. Hats off to Maplesville, they were the better team today.”
