Wakefield walks off Pirates in extras

RALEIGH — As the Lumberton softball team met Wakefield in the third round of the North Carolina High School Athletic Association 4A state playoffs, the standard seven innings wasn’t enough to determine a victor.

But Wakefield pushed across a run in the eighth inning, giving the Wolverines a 2-1 walk-off win to advance to the fourth round.

Wakefield (24-2), the No. 2 seed in the 4A East Region, scored the winning run after an infield error by the No. 7 Pirates (24-5), eliminating Lumberton for the second straight season after a second-round matchup last year.

“One play doesn’t make a difference in the game; if it happens in the first inning, we’re probably not even thinking about it,” Lumberton coach Mackie Register said. “”It’s a tough loss, it’s going to take (some time). But once everything settles and we look back at everything we’ve done, I’m extremely proud of everything we’ve accomplished.”

Brenna Colleran and Dayna Bland each reached base on bunt singles to start the bottom of the eighth for the Wolverines, before Colleran came home after the error on a ball put in play by Brooke Masingale.

The Pirates narrowly missed taking the lead in the top half of the extra frame; Alyssa Stone reached on a one-out walk, and a ball down the left-field line by Alona Hanna that would have been an extra-base hit was foul by the narrowest of margins.

“It was probably about two balls foul,” Register said. “But that’s the game of softball, it comes down to a game of inches sometimes.”

Halona Sampson pitched well once again for Lumberton, allowing one earned run on five hits with one walk and six strikeouts.

“She only gave up one earned run in the last three games in the playoffs,” Register said. “She gives us a chance to win every time she’s out there. She’s a bulldog, she kept hitting her spots and executing the game plan, and my assistant coaches did a great job calling the game too. Kept them off balance, but just unfortunate there at the end.”

Offensively, the Pirates hit the ball hard at time against Wakefield’s Dayna Bland, but couldn’t get many balls to fall in; Bland ultimately allowed one unearned run on three hits with three walks and seven strikeouts in eight innings pitched.

“Our approach at the plate, we worked on it in between rain storms and everything, we’ve been working on going middle to back side against her, and we executed some things and put the ball in play,” Register said. “When you make runs you’ve got to get a break once in a while, and we just didn’t get a lucky break today.”

The inning in which Lumberton scored was simultaneously the Pirates’ biggest missed opportunity. The run came after Tiara Stueck and Alona Hanna each singled to start the fourth inning; Stueck’s courtesy runner, Mackenzie Register, got caught in a rundown after Jaelyn Hammond put the ball in play on a ground ball, but Wakefield dropped the ball allowing Register to score the game’s first run.

Hanna, then, caught the Wolverines off guard and appeared to come down the third-base line to score herself — but the home-plate umpire said time was called due to Lumberton players being out of the dugout as they celebrated the first run; this sent Hanna back to third base. A lineout was turned into a double play and a groundout ended the inning with Hanna still at third base.

“We would’ve scored the second run there, but the umpire called timeout because one of our kids was out of the dugout — even though their kids were coming out of the dugout all game long,” Mackie Register said. “But if we would’ve scored that second run and we would’ve been up 2-1, the game would’ve already been over (before the eighth).”

Sampson retired the first seven batters of the game — including stellar defensive plays in the first from Lumberton outfielders Alona Hanna and Aniya Merritt, with Hanna making an over-the-shoulder catch that may have prevented the ball from carrying over the short outfield wall, and Merritt making a diving catch on the left-field line to rob an extra-base hit.

Brianna Riehle hit a home run over the left-field scoreboard for Wakefield, tying the game at 1-1 in the fourth. The Wolverines’ only other threat before the eighth came in the sixth, when Sampson stranded baserunners at first and second.

Lumberton, meanwhile, couldn’t cash in a one-out single by Sampson in the fifth or a leadoff walk by Stueck in the sixth.

Stueck, Alona Hanna and Sampson recorded hits for Lumberton. Colleran and Bland had two hits each for Wakefield from the bottom two spots in the lineup.

Wakefield will face No. 11 Wake Forest in the fourth round on Friday.

Lumberton’s loss ends the Pirates’ season after a program-record 24 wins. The Pirates won the United-8 Conference regular-season title outright and the Robeson County Slugfest championship, reaching the third round of the playoffs for the first time.

“(We have) 47 wins in two years, set the school record last year and broke it this year,” Mackie Register said. “Individually we’ve got a bunch of school records that probably won’t ever be touched. It’s going to take a good group of girls coming in to match what these girls have done. Six seniors, and I couldn’t have scripted it any better for two years for those girls, and all the success they’ve had.”

Those seniors — Alona Hanna, Merritt, Carlee Register, Sampson, Stone, Stueck — each played a major role in the program’s success over the last two seasons. All six are college-bound, Mackie Register said, with four of them signed to play college softball.

“It just speaks to what they’re doing, not only on the field but in the classroom as well,” Mackie Register said. “That’s what this is about, grooming these kids to be successful in the community and in their lives, and these girls are going to be successful.”