Durant head coach Jimmie Wyrick knew the exact scenario going to Coweta last week in hopes of securing a Class 5A home regional this week. And the DHS skipper used that knowledge to his full advantage even though it meant losing the game.
Wyrick issued three straight intentional walks to force in the winning run and give Coweta an 8-7 victory in the bottom of the seventh inning.
It was Durant that was celebrating, however, as the Lady Lions had the district tiebreaker advantage needing either a win or a loss by one run only after defeating the Lady Tigers 3-1 earlier in the season.
The game was a back-and-forth affair throughout but Durant freshman Allee Cooper came up huge at the plate every time she came to the plate during the pivotal contest, belting four hits in four at bats while coming around to score each time. She doubled twice, tripled and even homered to power the Lady Lion offensive attack which tallied 12 hits altogether.
Cooper smacked a one-out double in the seventh and came around to score after an Emma Sherrer single and Dasia Lewis sacrifice fly. That knotted the score at 7-7 and set the stage for Wyrick’s decision following a one-out single that put a runner on.
The Lady Lions trailed 4-1 after two innings before exploding for four runs in the third to surge in front. Anslee Morse started the rally with a two-out single and raced home ahead of Cooper on her inside- the-park home run. Sherrer followed a single, Lewis tripled in a run to tie it and scored on a Korbyn Robinson single.
Cooper doubled and scored on a Lewis double in the fifth frame.
Lewis wrapped up with a double, triple and three batted in with Sherrer also contributing two hits. Kenzie Trotter tossed in a double with one single each from Morse, Robinson and Harper Plymale.
