Baconton Charter eliminated from playoffs

BACONTON —The Baconton Charter softball team’s season came to an end Wednesday evening as they dropped a doubleheader to Bowdon High 8-2 and 6-0 in the second round of the Georgia High School Association Class A public playoffs.

The loss kept the Lady Blazers from making a second straight trip to Columbus.

Bowdon got on the board first in the first game when Macy Besrden’s sacrifice fly scored Haley Smiley in the top of the third inning. The Lady Blazers answered in the bottom of the third, tying it after an RBI single from Katie Classon brought Madison Watson home.

It was a rough fourth inning that doomed the Lady Blazers as Bowdon loaded the bases and made it out of the top of the inning scoring three runs.

Katelyn Grant hit an RBI single for Baconton in the bottom of the fourth to make it 4-2, but the Lady Blazers were never able to get any closer as a three-run sixth inning helped Bowdon put the game away.

Baconton head coach Bubber Birdsong said his team got into too many jams.

“We were trying to stay out of the big inning,” he said. “We made some plays, but we couldn’t get out of it and that turned out to be the difference in the game.”

The Lady Blazers showed promise in the second game loading the bases immediately before getting one out and then hitting into a double play. Birdsong said that set the tone for the second game that they were ultimately shut out in.

“I thought we had a chance to break the game open in the top of the first when we hit into that double play,” he said. “It didn’t break our back, but it kind of killed our momentum. We struggled from that point and we had chances to get a couple runs early and maybe force Game 3, but to their credit, they got out of the inning and the girls settled in.”

Baconton would go three up and three down in three of the last six innings. Despite the results of both games, Birdsong said overall they hit well but couldn’t make the big plays they needed. He added that facing a pitcher like Besrden in the first game didn’t make things any easier.

“We left way too many runners on base early on,” he said. “And that girl was very good, probably the best pitcher we’ve seen all year. She threw really good and we got good at bats, but we never could get the big hit.”

Birdsong said Bowdon is coming out of a region that features the number one team in the state, so they’re battle-tested and showed the Lady Blazers what they need to improve upon to get to that level. He noted that he is optimistic that they’ll make strides to get there.

“We made it to the elite eight last year and I lost four, four-year starters, so to get back to this point was really a tribute to the girls because we had some young girls,” he said. “I only lose one girl off of this team, so we’ll be pretty good next year,” he said.

Katelyn Grant was the lead hitter in the first game finishing 2 for 4 with two RBIs. Dale Elmore was the pitcher in both contests and finished the day with a total of four strikeouts.