Kennett defeats Senath-Hornersville to capture Bootheel conference title

The stage was set for another great match-up between rivals as the Kennett Indians and the Senath-Hornersville Lions faced off for the chance to become Bootheel conference champions for 2010.

Although both clubs battled to the very last out, it was the Kennett Indians who came out on top to earn the title by the final score of 5 to 3. The score makes this came look close, but Kennett was able to dominate on both offense and defense to shut down the Lions for six-straight innings.

However, the Lions wouldn't go down in defeat without a fight as they were able to score three runs in the top of the seventh to put the Indians' lead in jeopardy, but their comeback was halted as the Indians, led by an outstanding performance on the mound by Laurel Jones, put the Lions away and came out with the victory and the championship.

The Indians' offense was very consistent throughout the ballgame. Kennett was able to put up the first two runs of the game off of a two RBI double by Ciara Dewrock. Dewrock came up big again in this ballgame as she scored another RBI in the third. Overall, Dewrock led all batters in the game, going 3 for 3 with three RBI's and three runs scored.

When it comes to the Lions' offense, it was nonexistent through six innings as they were shut out on the scoreboard and only put up two hits. The credit has to go to both Jones' pitching and the great defense of the Indians. Not only did Jones strike out nine batters in the game, she also forced the Lions into eight ground outs.

With Kennett up 5 to 0 after six innings, it seemed that the Indians had the game already won, but the Lions showed that they wouldn't go down without a fight.

Senath-Hornersville's Hannah Kennedy led off the final inning with a triple and then scored on an RBI single by Maggy Smith. With the Lions now down by four runs and down to their last out, Shelby Sullivan came up with an RBI double to score Smith from second. During the same play, Sullivan was able to score on two throwing errors by Kennett to pull Senath-Hornersville to with in two runs of tying the game. It was then that Laurel Jones came up with her most important strikeout of the season as she put away the final Senath-Hornersville batter to clinch the victory for the Indians.

With the win, the Indians' celebrate back-to-back conference championships. Kennett head coach Laurie Vaughan praised her teams' effort in holding off the Lions' comeback. "It's wonderful to be conference champions. I'm so proud of these girls and so happy for them to end their season this way."

Vaughan also commended Senath-Hornersville for their tough play throughout the ballgame. "You got to give credit to Senath. They didn't quit and give up like most teams would. We made some mental mistakes and they capitalized on them, but when it came down to it we sucked it up and wouldn't allow (Senath-Hornersville) to get any more runs."

Lions' head coach Shane Jordan also praised his team for not giving up down the stretch. "Although Kennett scored on us early in the game, I'm proud of our team for playing hard. The girls showed a lot of courage, (Jones) shut us down throughout the ballgame, but in the last inning we got things rolling. You have to give a lot of credit to Kennett for the way they played."

This championship for the Indians marks their second title in the past four seasons. The credit has to go to the leadership of the nine seniors on the ball club to lead their team to great success for the past four years. There is one message that the Kennett seniors want to send to future Kennett softball teams and that's "Keep it going."

Their hope is that Kennett is always successful in softball and that the team keeps bringing home those conference championship trophies, just like they did in this ballgame.