Sports

Sweepin’ up

• The Lady Cavs softball team improves to 5-1 in Region XVII with a twin bill sweep of conference foe Middle Georgia.

Derek Barichello

ALBANY — One Heather Crews swing changed the  whole afternoon.

Before Crews belted the home run that secured a 2-1 Darton College win in Game 1 of a doubleheader against Middle Georgia College on Wednesday and propelled them to a 10-2 rout in Game 2, the Lady Cavaliers were struggling at the plate, having squandered one opportunity after another.

"I was just thinking, I need to get in the run and just put it in play," Crews said about her blast that moved the Lady Cavs' record to 5-1 in the GJCAA. "She left it up there for me and I can't begin to explain how happy I was to see it go. I knew it was gone."

In the first five innings of the opener, Darton left seven runners on base and trailed, 1-0. The Lady Cavaliers’ best opportunity came in the third with the bases loaded and nobody out, but ended on a double play and groundout.

In the sixth, it all changed. Hannah Layton led off with a double and Crews fouled off a pair of pitches, before slamming the 0-2 pitch in her wheelhouse deep over the left field fence.

The Lady Cavaliers would not have been in the game at all if it were not for strong pitching from Stephanie Martin. She allowed an unearned run in the first inning and did not allow a hit until the sixth, fanning nine batters in the game.

"I knew I had it, if it were not for that one stupid hit," Martin said of her attempt to pitch the second no-hitter of her Darton career, the first of which came against Bishop State Community College. "I was shooting for it. I basically pitched (MGC) inside and changed speeds. They had a lot of slap hitters, so I threw a lot of screwballs."

Slow starts like that in Game 1 on Wednesday are nothing new to Darton this season. After the Lady Cavaliers opened their season 6-0 with a tournament title in Dothan, Ala., Darton coach David Dews said his team went into an offensive slump, and as a result, lost nine of their next 12 games.

But with Wednesday afternoon marking the Lady Cavs' third consecutive series sweep, Dews is starting to believe his young team is making progress after improving their overall record to 15-9.

"We're really picking it up as of late," Dews said of his freshmen-laden team, which only carries two sophomores. "We have a lot of young players and made a lot of mistakes early in the season that cost us some games. Now, we are playing better softball."

The momentum from game one carried over to game two and the Lady Cavaliers' had no trouble hitting. They cracked 12 hits and scored 10 runs in the five-inning, eight-run rule victory, giving further evidence Darton is coming out of its slump.

Morgan Jones and Cali Lovett's home runs in the second got the offense going, giving the Lady Cavs a 4-0 lead. Darton finished the deal in the fifth, scoring five runs on four hits, with the clincher coming on a Kayla Baugh double.

With only one loss in conference play, Dews hopes his team will compete for a title but said it was still too early to speculate too much.

"We're in good position," the coach said. "That's a long time away."

FATHER vs. SON

The Lady Cavaliers will return to action today against Wallace Dothan at 2 p.m. at their home field in what will be a special game for Dews. His father, Gene, coaches Wallace-Dothan. The two teams met earlier this year in a preseason scrimmage, but never before in the regular season "It should be a fun day," the Darton coach said. "They have a great, traditional program.”

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