White Knoll Softball overcoming loss of senior hitter; baseball struggles
By WORTHY EVANS
Contributing Writer
Columbia - The young White Knoll softball team, ranked 10th in the High School Sports Report’s 5A Division II State Softball Top 10, has taken big steps forward this spring, but took a big loss recently. The Timberwolves, which returned 12 players from a 6-17 effort last year, are 9-6-1 overall and 3-4 in Region 4-5A going into Spring Break. They took a big hit recently when senior centerfielder Allie Royer was lost for the year with an ACL injury in an 11-2 loss to Lexington March 27.
Royer, who signed with North Greenville, batted .536 with five doubles, a triple and 12 runs batted in through eight games, and left a noticeable gap in the lineup, longtime head coach April Farr said.
“It’s been an emotional roller coaster,” Farr said. “This is a really close-knit group, we’re like family.”
Since that loss, the team pulled together and went 3-1 in a mid-season tournament March 28-29, scoring 10 runs in a loss to Ashley Ridge, then beating Bamberg-Ehrhardt, Dorman and May River.
Since then they’ve gone 1-2 in region play, beating River Bluff 15-4, but falling 5-2 to Chapin and 5-3 to Dutch Fork.
“Our record doesn’t speak volumes right now,” Farr said. “We should be 4-2 or 5-1 with that loss to Lexington, but I don’t know. We should have come away with some more wins. We’ve had some very exciting games, with a few players making errors they don’t usually make, but in the end we’ve got to come away with a win.”
A previous matchup with Dutch Fork comes to mind, a 13-12 loss March 21. The Timberwolves led 6-5 after three innings, but the Silver Foxes scored two runs in the top of the fourth to take a 7-6 lead. White Knoll responded with four runs in the bottom of that frame to take a 10-7 lead. Later the Timberwolves held an 11-8 lead but a 5-run sixth inning gave Dutch Fork a 13-11 lead and White Knoll’s seventh-inning rally fell short.
“Dutch Fork is a good team, and we kept up with them pretty well,” Farr said. “But it was like every time they hit the ball they dropped it in a little hole and it cost us.”
Even with the unlucky moments, Farr said she is proud about the way her team has come together. Besides Royer, seniors Nikk Gallardo signed with Providence College and Ashlynn Blackstone signed with Columbia College.
Blackstone, a first baseman/third baseman is batting .468 with four doubles, a home run and 19 RBI. Gallardo is hitting .362 with eight doubles, a home run and 17 RBI.
Sophomore infielder Jaida Gay is batting .405 with four doubles, a homer and 10 RBI.
The White Knoll baseball team has been having its share of growing pains with a largely new roster and a new coach in Dolan Crolley, who took Blythewood to the 5A state championship series in 2023 as interim coach. The Timberwolves are 3-15 and 0-8 in the region but have shown signs of battling in several games. They fell to Irmo twice in one-run losses, and twice to SCISA’s Cardinal Newman in two one-run losses.
White Knoll plays Newberry, Mid-Carolina, and Gilbert in a tournament over Spring Break before finishing region play with a pair of games against Chapin.
Junior third baseman Dillon Woods leads the team with a .333 batting average with five doubles, a home run and nine runs batted in.
