WADESBORO, N.C. – On the heels of clinching at least a share of the Sandhills Athletic Conference regular season title Tuesday against Seventy-First High School, the Lady Raiders softball team traveled across the Pee Dee River to face non-conference Anson High School on Wednesday.
Just 24 hours after crushing the Lady Falcons 17-0 behind junior pitcher Greyson Way’s third five-inning no-hitter of the season, No. 1 Richmond (15-3) rolled past the Lady Bearcats 11-2 to win its fourth straight game, and its fourth non-conference matchup of the year. It was Richmond’s largest margin of victory over Anson since it mercy-ruled the Lady Bearcats 12-2 in six innings in 2010 when current junior varsity head coach Casey Snead was Richmond’s pitcher.
Facing a more competitive pitcher in Anson’s Cydney Livingston than what they saw against Seventy-First’s Unique Nash, the Lady Raiders rattled off 16 hits in the win, including five doubles and one home run.
With the 16-hit explosion, which is tied for the second-most in a single game this season (the most hits in a game this season is 17 against Purnell Swett High School on March 9), the Lady Raiders boosted their team batting average to .366, which is the highest cumulative team average since the 2014 season when they batted .351 in 29 games.
Richmond has also tallied 185 hits through 18 games played this season (10.3 hits per game), and has roped 47 doubles (third-most in 4A) and 28 home runs (first in 4A), according to Maxpreps. Per that mark, the Lady Raiders are averaging a home run as a team in every 18.07 at-bats.
Wednesday’s game was also the 11th time during the 2018 campaign that the Lady Raiders reached double-digits in hits. Leading the charge at the plate Wednesday were a plethora of players, as juniors Savannah Lampley and Taylor Parrish, along with true freshman Payton Chappell, led the team with three hits each. Lampley smashed two doubles, while Chappell added another. Eight of the 10 Lady Raiders to dig in at the plate collected at least one hit on the night, while seven of them recorded an RBI.
But the hits didn’t happen right away, as head coach Wendy Wallace explained her team had to “make some adjustments” at the plate after struggling to make contact in the opening two innings.
“After we made some adjustments, the girls hit really good tonight,” Wallace said following the game. “Compared to the speed we saw (against Seventy-First), she (Livingston) looked like she was throwing 70 miles an hour. But they did a good job getting their timing down and hit the ball solid.”
A lone one-out single by Parrish was the only ball put safely in play by Richmond until it broke the game’s scoreless tie in the top of the third inning. In that frame, Chappell, who Wallace noted as “being like a second leadoff batter” in the nine-hole, led off with a single to right field. In the next at-bat, Lampley showed off her strength with some opposite field power, smashing a double to the left-center gap. Chappell got on her horse and scored safely from first to put the Lady Raiders up 1-0. Livingston would escape the inning without any further damage, stranding two Lady Raiders base runners.
Anson (7-8) would answer back in the home half of the third when Way gave up a one-out single to Grace Morgan. After getting Livingston to fly out to Madison Jordan in left field, Anson’s Katie Horne belted a two-run shot to center field and gave her team a 2-1 lead for the time being.
After the home run, Way (15-3) was lights out from the circle. She would only allow three more base runners on the night (two hits and a walk), and racked up 10 Lady Bearcat strikeouts. She continues to lead 4A competition in total strikeouts (156), and has struck out 35 percent of the total number of batters she’s faced this season (156/452).
But the one-run Anson lead was fleeting, as the Lady Raiders’ bats found magic in the top of the fourth inning. Batting through the entire lineup, Richmond blasted six straight hits to start the inning, and took over the game by scoring five runs before Livingston could stop the bleeding.
Parrish ripped her second of three singles on the night to lead off the fourth, and freshman Paige Ransom raked the first pitch she saw in the next at-bat over the center field wall for a towering two-run blast. Not only was it her team-leading eighth longball of the season, she also broke Way’s record for the most home runs hit by a freshman in a single season. During her freshman year in 2016, Way knocked seven homers in the team’s 27 games.
A Jordan single, followed by a Chappell RBI double to the right-center wall gave Richmond a 4-2 lead. The Lady Raiders would collect two more hits in the next two at-bats (a Lampley RBI single; and an Owen Bowers RBI double) to put the game out of reach, and go up 6-2.
“Owen is starting to see the ball better and better,” Wallace commented about her senior catcher who’s working her way out of a slump at the plate. “And Greyson is hitting it and pitching it well, too.
“Paige is staying hot after taking a night off from hitting a home run,” Wallace joked. “But she hit the ball solid tonight. And another big thing is that Payton is starting to hit her stride in the nine-hole, which will help us if she can get on at the bottom of the lineup with Savannah, Owen and Greyson coming up behind her.”
Richmond would plate three more runs and extend its lead to 9-2 in the top of the sixth inning, courtesy of two Lady Bearcats errors, and RBI bloop single by Way and a sacrifice fly by sophomore first baseman Kayla Hawkins.
The Lady Raiders weren’t finished, as they continued to pour on the runs in the game’s final inning, as Chappell scored on a passed ball after hitting a leadoff single, stealing second, and advancing to third on another Anson passed ball. Bowers would end the night’s scoring thanks to a Horne throwing error, as the first baseman tried to pickoff Bowers at third following a force out at first. Horne’s errant throw sailed over Morgan’s head, allowing Bowers to trot home uncontested.
Lampley and Ransom, along with Horne, led all players with two RBIs on the night. Brianna Baysek, Bowers, Chappell, Hawkins and Way each brought home a run to round out Richmond’s offensive outpouring.
Richmond will cap off its three-game week Friday by traveling to Seventy-First in Fayetteville. With a win, the Lady Raiders will enter the final week of regular season play as the undisputed, outright champions of the SAC for the 2018 season, their sixth-straight year of doing so. First pitch is set for 6 p.m.
NOTE: For the first time this season, the junior varsity team played at the same location as the varsity squad. Head coach Snead’s team went on to win 6-4 in four innings (time limit due to varsity game). Freshman shortstop Kearston Bruce finished the day with three hits, including an inside-the-park home run and five of the team’s six RBIs. Fellow freshman catcher Georgia Grace Anderson added an RBI single in the win.
