5A softball: Newsome's team effort puts Wolves in semifinals

Class 5A

Newsome reaches semis on team effort

LITHIA — Newsome pitcher Ashley Stubbs wasn't at her best but fortunately for the Wolves, her teammates were.

Newsome cracked 11 hits and Stubbs pitched her way out of a tenuous seventh-inning jam as Newsome advanced to Friday's region semifinal with a 10-6 win against visiting Land O'Lakes Tuesday night.

"My team totally had my back tonight," Stubbs said. "This win was all them."

The Wolves posted eight runs in the second inning, turning a one-run deficit into a 9-2 lead. Tougher to swallow for the Gators: all of Newsome's runs in the inning came with two outs.

Jessica Austin's RBI single in the first put the Gators ahead 2-0 before the Wolves' Nicollette Levine doubled home a run in the bottom of the inning.

Then came the second.

The Wolves got seven hits and sent 12 to the plate. With two outs and runners on second and third, Laura Lovell singled through the left side of the infield to tie it at 2. After an error that scored another run, Jenn Owens, Lewis, Meaghan Schultz and Bailey Schinella hit consecutive doubles with an Ally Ledenham single in between.

Land O'Lakes (18-4) cut it to 10-5 in the seventh before Stubbs got Loren Smith — the tying run — to fly out to left to end the game.

Brandon Wright,

Times correspondent