SEASON WRAP-UP
Multiple factors were stacked against the Lady Greyhounds in last week’s GHSA state tournament super regional. Its roster thinned by key injuries, Jones County also drew a matchup in the four-team double-elimination format against defending state champion Northside Columbus.
It was a setting where some groups would have folded, going through the motions in two convincing losses to end the season.
The Lady Greyhounds gave the opposition all that it could handle, hanging close with Northside in a 4-0 loss before falling in the loser’s bracket to Statesboro 8-7 in extra innings to end their season.
Against Northside, Kimber Kent had the Lady Greyhounds lone hit with Cate Downey keeping Jones County close, holding the Patriots to four runs and seven hits. Northside scored once in the first and three more times in the third. The Lady Hounds had a runner in scoring position twice with Myah Briscoe reaching third in the first and Tranasia Parker in the sixth, but JCHS was unable to push a run across.
Down 6-4 to Statesboro after five innings, the Lady Greyhounds forced extra innings with a pair of runs in the top of the seventh before the Blue Devils won it in extra innings. It ended a back-andforth game in which Jones County lad 2-0 after the first half inning, 3-2 in the third and 4-3 in the top of the fifth before a three-run fifth inning by Statesboro put them up 6-4.
Tranasia Parker and Allie Miller led the Lady Hounds in the loss with one double apiece. Rylie Faulk and Leah Betts drove in a pair of runs with single runs being driven in by Allie Willis and Allie Miller. Willis and Faulk also had three and two hits, respectively.
Jones County rotated multiple pitchers against Statesboro. Downey went an inning and two thirds, giving up two runs and three hits. She’d give way to one freshman, Ensley Barnes, who gave up four runs and three hits in three innings before another freshman, Kaleigh Scarborough, yielded a run and a hit in the final two and a third innings.
“We played (Northside) tough and just had a few errors that cost us. They did a good job of coming out and fighting,” Lady Greyhounds head coach Tripp Burt said. “Against Statesboro, it was kind of back and forth. They fought the entire time.”
“We had a tough week with all of the injuries,” Burt said. “It would have been easy to call it quits, but they gave it all that they had.”
Challenges were not something that Jones County backed away from all season long. Other than Northside, five other JCHS opponents from this season will play in their classification’s Elite 8 this week in Columbus. That rigor of that schedule shows how thin the margin was for the Lady Greyhounds from being in a strong position to advance to Columbus.
Of Jones County’s final four losses to of the regular season, three were by two runs or fewer and two by a run. One of those was to Union Grove, a result that would have given JCHS no worse than a No. 2 super regional seed and better draw.
“We have a tough schedule each year so that when it’s the postseason you don’t get many surprises,” Burt said. “We played a lot of close games and had opportunities to win a lot of games that we lost. A few things go different here and there and you are talking a whole different result.”
As the season closes, the Lady Hounds will say goodbye to a senior class with a resume of two Elite 8 trips, a region title, a region tournament title and state championship.
Jones County, which began the season with a total of eight seniors, will look to a combined class of nine sophomores and juniors to lead the way next year. That includes power-hitting Tranasia Parker and top two pitchers Ansley Pegg and Cate Downey along with two freshmen that saw time in the pitcher’s circle in the postseason due to injuries – Barnes and Scarborough.
“They got thrown into the fire. The ones that got in there, they showed a lot of poise,” Burt said. “You obviously hope that when you are in that situation again, you’ll be there as a seasoned veteran. It was good for them to get that experience.”
