CONCORDIA — When the Cloud County Community College T-Birds walked-off against the Red Devils with a two-out, two-run home run in the bottom of the eighth inning in the first game of Tuesday’s three-game playoff series, things certainly looked bleak for the Red Devils.
The 11-9 extra-innings victory for the higher-seeded T-Birds meant that in order to advance to the second round of regionals in Topeka this weekend, the Red Devils would have to win two-straight.
First things first though. Allen needed to take game two to force a win-or-go-home game and with their season hanging in the balance, coach Jaime Jensen turned to Sierra Thompson.
The freshman wasn’t even remotely in the team’s pitching plans at the beginning of the season, but necessity is the mother of invention and midway through the season, Jensen began throwing Thompson.
Thompson has responded with a team-low 3.81 ERA this season with a strategy of pounding the strike zone. She has allowed just 15 walks in 79 innings this year.
The soft-tosser got the job done once again in game two and threw a complete game with just four hits allowed and two runs with no strikeouts and just one walk.
The Allen offense was slow to come around though and trailed 2-0 going into the fifth, but then the light came on for the Red Devil hitters.
Caitlin Burns got things started with a RBI single, but it was sophomore Morgan Wayman who provided the spark that would catapult her team to Topeka.
Trailing 2-1 with two runners on and two outs in the fifth, Wayman took the first pitch she saw over the right field fence to put Allen in front 4-2.
Julia Keating and Sarah Eckart added RBI singles in the seventh inning to provide some insurance, but Thompson already had plenty and the Red Devils forced game three with a 6-2 victory.
In game three, the Red Devils sent out freshman Dela Boyd to the mound.
Boyd’s early-season struggles were part of the reason for Thompson’s emergence, but with the biggest game of the Red Devils’ season resting on her arm, Boyd delivered.
The freshman threw a complete-game and didn’t surrender an earned run. She allowed five hits and five walks while striking out two.
The Red Devils fell behind 1-0 in the second inning on an unearned run, but their offense caught fire in the fourth and they didn’t look back on the way to a 11-2 victory and a ticket to Topeka.
Eckart and Thompson had RBIs in the fourth to give Allen the 2-1 lead and that lead grew to 4-1 in the fifth with RBIs by Burns and Keating.
Cloud got a run back in the fifth on an Allen error, but in the sixth, the Red Devils put the game away with RBIs by Winter Henry and Emma Broxterman, before Keating put a the final nail in the T-Bird coffin with a three-run home run.
Allen added two more in the final inning to provide the final 11-2 score.
While Wayman, Thompson and Boyd turned the tables in the series, Henry, a freshman, was the most consistent Red Devil throughout the day. In the three games, she went a combined 9-for-14, including four hits in game three.
UP NEXT
The Red Devils head to Topeka this weekend.
