An extra inning rally wasn’t enough for the Fort Mill softball team as they dropped game one to the Byrnes Rebels in the 5A Upper State championship series.
Fort Mill lost 3-2 in 10 innings to Byrnes and will now have to win Wednesday to force a game three in the series. Fort Mill falls to 17-5 on the season.
The Jackets opened the game up scoring in the bottom of the first inning to go up 1-0. Trinity Wall drove in Ava Balsinger, who reached on a fielder’s choice, to give Fort Mill an early lead.
Fort Mill held that lead until the fourth inning when Byrnes tied the game up at 1-1 on a sacrifice fly after a lead-off triple to open the inning by the Rebels’ Tiara Pearson.
The two teams then went scoreless for the next five innings forcing extra softball for those at Fort Mill High.
In the tenth inning, Byrnes scored on another sacrifice fly with Calee Smith scoring after she started the inning off on second base as part of international rules. The sacrifice gave the Rebels a 2-1 lead and then they extended that lead later in the inning off a solo home run to left field off the bat of Haylee Whiteside to make it 3-1.
Fort Mill was able to get one of those runs back in the bottom of the tenth inning, but not able to tie the game. Brynn Bartolini singled to knock in Sydnie Spears, who started the inning off on second base for the Jackets. Bartolini was able to eventually make it to third and Balsinger was able to make it to second after singling, but both got left stranded to end the game.
For the Jackets, pitcher Maddie Drerup went all 10 innings and allowed two runs on seven hits, while walking two and striking out four.
Game two is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at Byrnes. A game three, if necessary, would be at a neutral site Friday.
Mac Banks: mac@fortmillprepsports.com, @fortprep
