Ferry Goes Back-To-Back
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By KIM NORTH
For the News-Register
ELM GROVE -- After winning its first dozen games of the season, the Martins Ferry softball team tasted defeated for the initial time Thursday at Edison. They didn't like the taste.
Deadlocked with No. 2 seeded Shenandoah at 1 after two-and-a-half innings Friday, the top-seeded Purple Riders (13-1) took out their frustrations with seven hits that plated eight runs in the bottom of the third en route to an 11-2 triumph and back-to-back Ohio Valley Athletic Conference Class 3A Tom Bechtel Softball Championships on sun-splattered Lisa's Field at the I-470 J.B. Chambers Complex.
The contest was halted after five-and-a-half frames due to the 10-run mercy rule.
"Not because it's our second in a row, but I'm happy that the girls can win a second straight OVAC Championship," third-year Martins Ferry head coach Jerry Magistro, who collected his 12th overall OVAC softball title. He won 10 Class A crowns while at St. John Central. "The girls have worked so hard this season in trying to get back here, so it's nice to see that their hard work has paid off.
"It's never a blessing in disguise when you lose, but these girls were ready to get back on the field and turn things around," Magistro said. "They don't like to lose, and neither do I."
Like in their semifinal against Linsly two days earlier, the Purple Riders found themselves down 1-0 as Laney Hitchens' RBI single with two outs in the top of the first drove in Bailey Frye. However, the lead was short-lived.
Hunter Pollock was instrumental in this come-from-behind win as she walked to start the bottom of the first. Danielle Lude sacrificed her to second where she scored from on a double off the fence in left-center by Maria Clark to even things.
Kaylynn Zinn, the No. 9 hitter in the lineup, jump-started Martins Ferry's third-inning outburst in which 13 batters went to the plate. The junior sent a 3-1 pitch from Mya Leach well over the fence in left-center for a 2-1 advantage, and the Purple Riders never looked back. It was her second roundtripper of the season. She singled in the frame, as well.
Pollock walked for the second of three times and Lude singled. Clark found the gap in left-center again for another two-bagger as Pollock scored. Taylor Bell followed with a two-run double to right-center; No. 8 hitter Eve Agnew singled in two more tallies; and Pollock capped the inning with a two-run single.
"This was another total team victory," Magistro noted. "Every girl in the lineup contributed, as did a couple off the bench."
Martins Ferry finished with 11 base hits, of which five were for extra bases. Clark, Bell and Zinn
"We can hit the ball from No. 1 to No. 9 in our order, and we hit the ball hard," Magistro added. "I think we've got girls on the bench that can hit, too. Allarah (Jones) came off the bench and got a hit today."
The Purple Riders added solo runs in the fourth and fifth innings on an RBI double by winning pitcher Lauren McFarland and a Bell run-producing single, respectively.
McFarland wasn't overpowering with five strikeouts and just a pair of walks. She allowed five hits and threw 101 pitches, of which 66 were strikes.
The championship is the fifth in program history. Other titles came in 2000, 2005, 2011 and 2021.