Morgan softball falls in regional tournament championship game
Published 9:30 pm Thursday, April 23, 2015
One out is all that stood between Morgan Academy and the class 3A, region 2 tournament championship Thursday at Fain Park in Montgomery.
The Senators led Autauga 2-1 in the bottom of the seventh and seemed poised to go into the Alabama Independent School Association state championship as a top seed, but Autauga’s Tara Ammons stopped any potential celebration in its tracks.
Ammons hit a three-run home run that gave Autauga the region championship and left Morgan with a little extra motivation going into the next week when more than just seeding will be on the line.
“Thank God it wasn’t state,” said Morgan Academy head coach Ed Miller. “To lose like that would’ve killed them, but they know this is just for seeding. We are going to go back to work and try to get our hitting corrected.”
The Senators struggled at the plate all day Thursday.
Morgan won its opening game, which served as a regional semifinal, over Monroe Academy 1-0, but even in that game the Senators mustered only five total hits.
Anna Gayle Hubbard singled to score the only run in the opener.
In the second contest, Morgan had only four hits, while Autauga had nine. The Senators scored first on a single by Jordan Averette that scored Lauren Criswell, but Morgan couldn’t hang onto the lead at the end.
“Two runs is not going to win it for you,” Miller said.
He said the team will go back to working on its batting in preparation for next week’s AISA state championships at Lagoon Park May 1-2.