Ozark slips by Ponytails

By Andy Brown

Published: July 3, 2008

The Eufaula Ponytails looked to be well on their way to a rematch with Troy in the championship round of the Sub-District 2 tournament in Ozark.

After one inning, Eufaula led tournament-host Ozark 6-4. Heading into the fifth inning, Eufaula held an 8-6 lead.

By the time the dust had settled, Ozark had rallied for a 10-8 win. The loss ended Eufaula’s season.

“We just didn’t play very well,” Eufaula head coach Clayton Adams said. “Our defense wasn’t very good and we didn’t really hit the ball all that well. We just got beat.”

The loss came just three days after Eufaula had topped Ozark 12-3 in their tournament opener.

After plating eight runs in the first four innings, Eufaula’s bats went cold thanks in part to an interesting strategy on Ozark’s part.

Rather than put in a hard-throwing pitcher to try and slow down Eufaula’s offensive attack, Ozark opted to go with a soft-tosser. The change of pace threw Eufaula’s hitters out of rhythm.

“They put in a girl that was super slow,” Adams said. “She threw a change up that almost looked like a slow pitch softball pitch. Our girls just couldn’t hit it.”

George Anne Whitehead, Mollie Dollar and Journi Shurtz were each 1-for-2 at the plate for Eufaula. Megan Spurlock and Chelsea Jones also collected a hit, while Cheyenne Ingram, Angel Long and Mallori Green all hit a double in the loss.

Madison Adams suffered the loss after yielding four runs in the final two innings of play. She came on in relief of Spurlock who struck out six of the seven batters she faced in two innings of work.

Jones started the game and surrendered six runs in two innings.

“We had chances to win the game,” Adams said. “It really just came down to the fact that we didn’t play very good defense, and we didn’t get hits when we needed them.”

Team members included Jones, Long, Dollar, Green, Ingram, Shurtz, Spurlock, Whitehead, Madison Adams, Hope Faircloth, Kristen Thomas and Jessica Wilson. The team was coached by Adams, Earl Jones and Ronnie Dollar.