Jenna Evans is lifted up by her teammates after CRHS made it back-to-back. (Photo/Paul Adkins)
The No. 7-ranked Lady Tigers did it again on Thursday night as Chapmanville secured its second straight Class AA state championship with a 3-1 win over No. 1 Ritchie County at Jackson Memorial Park in Vienna.
Chapmanville’s state title came as a surprise to many.
After last year’s Andi Williamson-led Lady Tigers breezed to a 31-3 record and the Double-A state title, some thought it would be a rebuilding year for Chapmanville.
Many said 2011 might be Chapmanville’s best shot at winning another state crown.
The Lady Tigers lost five senior starters from last year’s team and youthful Chapmanville struggled through growing pains at times this season, particularly early on in the spring.
At one point, the Lady Tigers were just 6-6.
A possible sectional or regional tournament exit would most likely be in store for Chapmanville if this continued this way.
As the month of April wore on Lady Tigers’ coach Ronnie Ooten himself seemed to doubt his club would have enough talent to win the state championship, let alone even qualify to make it to Vienna.
But the Lady Tigers played the role of the underdog, fighting and clawing their way through the stretch drive of the season.
Chapmanville continued to improve and come together as the season unfolded.
The Lady Tigers beat Scott two games to none to win the sectional, then blanked Wayne, 2-0, in the Class AA regional semifinals, besting a team it had lost to twice during the regular season.
The Lady Tigers continued to surprise the pundits and knocked off No. 2-ranked Herbert Hoover, 4-0, in the regional final at Falling Rock to advance to the state tournament.
Then at state, Chapmanville took care of business.
The Lady Tigers rallied to beat Class AA tourney favorite Ritchie County, 3-2, in Wednesday’s state tournament opener, then blasted Shady Spring 12-2 to advance to the finals.
It would only take one more win for Chapmanville to go back-to-back.
But Ritchie County shut out the Lady Tigers 4-0 on Thursday to force a winner-take-all championship game.
Would this finally be the end of the line for the Chapmanville girls?
Nope.
The Lady Tigers had one last surprise in store as Chapmanville knocked off the Lady Rebels to win their third state championship in the last four years and its fifth in the last 12 seasons.
No one seemed any more pleased than Chapmanville 30-year coach Ronnie Ooten, who has led the Lady Tigers to all five of their state championships and is the only coach the program has ever known.
“A month or a month and a half ago I would have bet my house that we weren’t going to be here,” Ooten said. “I’ll take this fifth state championship and go back to Chapmanville happy.”
On the eve of the state tournament Chapmanville, the reigning state 2A champs, seemed happy just to make it.
“We were talking the other night and I said, ‘Boys, I’m just glad to be here,” Ooten said. “You know I wouldn’t have thought it. After the first four ballgames or so I talked to Haley McCann’s dad and he was talking about how this team would probably go 16-14 or 14-16 or something like that. I was sort of having that opinion myself.”
Led by sophomore twins Allison and Jenna Evans and senior third baseman Bre Thomas, the Lady Tigers hit their stride. After a late four-game losing skid in mid-April, Chapmanville closed the season sizzling hot, going 11-2 in its last 13 contest.
“This team went back-to-back and that’s no small thing,” Ooten said. “These kids lost their studs last year and everyone in the state said that we wouldn’t be worth you know what. We looked that way at the start of the year but by golly we put it together when it counted. I don’t know what else to say. I’m so excited.”
Chapmanville closed out the season with a 25-14 record, while Ritchie County was 37-4. The Lady Tigers went 2-2 vs. the Lady Rebels this season as Ritchie County had beaten Chapmanville 5-4 earlier in the season in the Best of the Best tourney at Buffalo.
The Lady Tigers, though, beat the Lady Rebels when it counted most.
Chapmanville jumped on top of the Lady Rebels 3-0 in the first inning in Thursday’s championship game. Freshman DP Talya Berry got it started with a two-run double off the left field fence to make it 2-0. First baseman Heather Nagy then ripped an RBI single of Ritchie County starter Ashley Wright to make it 3-0.
The lead stood.
In the bottom of the sixth, Ritchie County scratched out a run thanks to a pair of Chapmanville errors, to cut the deficit to 3-1.
But in the last half of the seventh, Chapmanville starting pitcher Jenna Evans experienced cramps in her pitching hand and had to leave the circle with a 3-2 count on RC’s Melanie Haddox and no outs.
Evans was replaced by her twin sister, Allison Evans, who had thrown 127 pitches in the previous game against Ritchie County earlier on the hot, sunny day.
Allison Evans finished off Haddox with one pitch, striking out the Lady Rebels’ DP.
She then got Cassie Ray to ground out to second and got Jesse Stemple to ground out to Jenna Evans at short to end the game.
The celebration was on.
“We made some mistakes in the first game but we put it together in the second game,” Ooten said.
Last night’s game was the final prep contest for Chapmanville seniors Thomas, Brittani Lowe, Lauren Shumate and Brianna Blankenship.
Since Thursday night was also Graduation Night back at Chapmanville, the Lady Tigers’ senior quartet were hoping to win the first game and still have enough time to make it for the CRHS graduation ceremony, albeit a bit late.
But when Ritchie County won in the first game and forced a second winner-take-all final, there was no hope to make it back.
Blankenship, a reserve, who had signed to play women’s softball at NAIA Pikeville College in Kentucky, chose to go back home to the graduation.
Lowe, Thomas and Shumate stayed behind.
Shumate and Lowe were two of the Valedictorians in Chapmanville Regional’s Class of 2010.
Lowe ended up giving her graduation speech over the ballfield’s P.A. system. The three senior players were honored on the field before the game and dressed in cap and gown.
Coach Ooten ended up giving Lowe, Shumate and Thomas their symbolic diplomas – yellow softballs – appropriately.
“We won it for these seniors,” Ooten said. “They had graduation tonight and didn’t go back. B.B. did and I have no hard feelings. I told the other three that they could go. It was no big deal. To win the state title doesn’t mean that much to me. This is their life.”
Jenna Evans and Berry were each 2-for-3 to lead the Lady Tigers’ bats. Evans was had Chapmanville’s only two hits – a single and a double – in the opening game loss to the Lady Rebels on Thursday.
Allison Evans also had a hit. Jenna Evans went six innings and allowed one run and five hits with five strikeouts and one walk.
Wright went five and yielded three runs and four hits with four strikeouts and two walks. She was relieved by Kelsey Waggoner in the sixth.
It appeared as if Ritchie County had dented the scoreboard in the bottom of the first. Down already 3-0, the Lady Rebels had runners on first and second with two outs when Tabitha Ezell ripped a hard smash down the left field line. The ball appeared to have hit the chalk right on the line as two Lady Rebel players scored. The umpires ruled the ball was foul, however.
Jenna Evans then got Ezell to pop out to first.
Instead of the 3-2 game it was still 3-0 Chapmanville.
Ritchie County never really recovered and continued to vent.
Chapmanville’s state title was its fifth overall and first back-to-back state crown in school history. Ooten also led Chapmanville to state titles in 1999, 2004, 2007 and 2009.
In the Lady Tigers’ four previous state tourney appearances since 1999, Chapmanville had a perfect 12-0 mark in state tourney games.
The loss to Ritchie County was Chapmanville’s first state tourney defeat during the span as the Lady Tigers are now 15-1 in the Big Dance since ‘99.
Allison Evans, Thomas and Jenna Evans were named to the all-tournament team.
Thomas had ripped a game-ending home run in Chapmanville’s mercy-shortened victory over Shady Spring on Wednesday night. Allison Evans pitched Chapmanville to its first two wins in the state tournament.
Allison Evans gave up four runs and eight hits in the losing cause to the Lady Rebels in Thursday’s first championship game.
Knight fired a two-hitter for Ritchie County. She struck out 12 and walked three for the game.
The Lady Rebels plated three in the fourth inning to lead 3-0. The big blow during the frame was a two-run single by Haddox. Laura Carpenter then hit a solo homer in the top of the seventh to make it 4-0.
Knight then got Chapmanville out in the bottom of the seventh to preserve the win.
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