Barnwell Softball Rallies For 9-7 Win Over Colleton County In Play-off Tune-up Game For Both Teams
By Billy G. Baker
Publisher
Walterboro—The Barnwell High (19-2) and Colleton County High (15-5) softball teams met in a final regular season “play-off tune-up” type game on May, 2 and the Warhorses rallied late in the game to pull-out a hard-fought 9-7 win.
“Very proud of the job our 7th grade pitcher (Kinsey Terrapin) did in the circle tonight,” said Barnwell head coach Mike Beasley. “We actually had two other seventh graders starting in this game, and for most of the season, in catcher Genesis Walker and shortstop Shalayah Badger. This just speaks volumes about the future of our softball program in Barnwell.

“This is our 8th game in 10 days, over the past two weeks, and we played against some real good teams, and we were 5-3 over this stretch,” said Coach Beasley. “We rested our senior number one pitcher Jaidyn Devore tonight to get her ready for the play-offs that start on Wednesday.
“All I know is that we will be hosting a four- team district play-off starting on Wednesday (May, 7) and that we will be playing and at-large team in the first game, but right now I can’t tell you who that team will be,” said Coach Beasley. “As long as we can keep winning, we will stay at home in the district, in the lower state play-offs, and in the first game of the state championship best of three series if we are fortunate enough to make it to the AA finals.”
Against Colleton County the teams were tied after six innings at 5-5.
In their top of the 7th inning, Barnwell used two singles, and took advantage of five Cougar errors to push across five runs in the inning to take a 9-5 lead. Sophomore Laney Grubbs got things started with a one-out single. Then sophomore Kendall O’Berry singled to put runners on first and second. With two out Brooklyn Gardner reached on an error to load the bases.
Then junior Abigial Corley hit a sharp ground ball, to the middle of the infield, that had the potential to end the inning, keeping the score tied. However, four throwing errors during the same play, cleared the bases, even scoring Corley who dove head first on home plate to make it 9-5 on one of the strangest set of errors witnessed by this writer in a long time.
Colleton County did not give up. The Lady Cougars came to back in the bottom of the 7th with redemption on their minds. Brooklyn Holmes started the inning off with a walk and then Alexa Eversole got her 4th hit of the game off of a single. Both runners stole bases to move up to second and third respectively with no-outs.
(At this point Coach Beasley replaced Terrapin in the circle with Grubbs, as the young Terrapin left the circle, she received a loud ovation from the Barnwell fans at the game.)
Xiomara Oxner then hit a SAC fly RBI to score Holmes to cut the deficit to 9-6. The next batter Bre Gerard hit a SAC fly RBI to make it 9-7. Then the Cougars got back-to-back singles from Madison Miller and Lanasia Sanders to have two on with two out. Grubbs got the next batter to ground out to short to end the game.
After the game, Colleton County 8-year head coach Tavara Edwards, told the HSSR, “We are 15-4 right now and we have a home play-off game on Tuesday, so all-in-all we have had a good season,” said Coach Edwards. “One of our senior leaders has been Lanasia Sanders who started out pitching tonight before we moved her to shortstop. She has been in the program five years and she is a real good leader for us both in the circle and at the plate.
“We have two other senior starters, one is center fielder Madison Miller who we moved over to left field later in the game, and the third senior is Kristina Rheam and we will miss all three of our senior starters,” said Coach Edwards. “We are a very young team but if my girls come out here and play with a clear head, they can compete with anyone.”
For the game Barnwell had six hits led by O’Berry who had two hits and one RBI. Grubbs had a hit and one RBI, and Corley had one hit and four RBI’s. Walker scored a run and produced two RBI’s, and Arnold scored a run with one RBI. Devore contributed a hit also.
In the circle Terrapin allowed two earned runs while striking out three. Grubbs picked up the save with a solid performance.
Colleton County had four players with multiple hits. Miller was 2-of-four including a double while McKenzie Cochran was 2-of-4 and junior Alexa Oversole went four-for-four and scored three runs. Bre Gerard had two hits and two RBI’s for the Cougars while Oxner had two RBI’s also.
Sanders started the game in the circle for CC and worked three innings with five K’s and she gave up four hits. Bre Gerard worked four innings with 7 K’s and she gave up two hits.
Devore, Barnwell’s ace pitcher will enter the AA play-offs having pitched 84.1 innings this season with 168 K’s and she has a stellar 0.83 ERA. Devore has signed to play at Howard University next season.
Terrapin is 4-0 having worked 17 innings in the circle with 18 K’s and she has an ERA of 1.65. Grubbs is at 4-1 with 35 K’s in 24.2 innings of work. Grubs has an ERA of 2.84.
Barnwell enters the playoffs with seven batters hitting over .300. Junior Shaelyn Badger paces the hit index at .471 and 10 RBI’s. Terrapin is next at .421 and six RBI’s. Shalayah Badger is at .375 with six RBI’s. Devore is hitting .344 with a team leading 23 RBI’s including five home runs. O’Berry is at .333 with 16 RBI’s and Walker is at .333 with 8 RBI’s. Gardner is hitting .317 with 10 RBI’s.
Colleton County comes into the play-offs with an incredible .414 team batting average. Holmes leads the way at .607 including 31 RBI’s, five triples and one home run. Eversole is next at .571 with 22 RBI’s followed by Sanders at .527 including 33 RBI’s and four homers.
Gerard is at .519 and 22 RBI’s entering the AAAA play-offs while Oxner is at .500 with three RBI’s. Cochran is at .360 with 20 RBI’s and Miller is hitting .356 with 14 RBI’s.
The Cougars are le din the circle by Gerard and Sanders. Gerard comes into the play-offs with a 7-1 record with 96 K’s in 60 innings of work with a 1.40 ERA. Sanders is 5-2 with 67 K’s in 40 innings pitched and she has a 2.45 ERA.
Retired Hall of Fame coach Rusty Adams serves as the pitching coach for Colleton County.
