Southeast Missouri State's softball season ends with 12-inning loss

Eastern Illinois senior second-team all-conference catcher Hannah Cole recorded just one hit in the Panthers' Ohio Valley Conference tournament opener on Wednesday and recorded outs in her first two at-bats against Southeast Missouri State starting pitcher Madeline Krumrey.

But with her team's season, and her career, on the line in an elimination game against the No. 7 Redhawks on Thursday, Cole nearly single-handedly led the sixth-seeded Panthers' comeback and sent the deciding blow over the fence in left field in the bottom of the 12th inning.

Cole led off the bottom of the 12th with a walk-off home run -- her second homer of the game -- to end Southeast's season with a 10-9 loss at Cougar Field on the campus of regular-season conference champion SIU Edwardsville in Edwardsville, Illinois.

"My first one I was bawling around the bases. I didn't want it to be my last at-bat and obviously I had a few more after that," Cole said of her home runs. "I hadn't been hitting so far in the tournament, and I was kind of fed up with mis-hits so I just decided to forget about everything and just swing with all that I had left."

The Redhawks rebounded from a 21-0 loss to Jacksonville State in the first round of the tournament on Wednesday. After being tied 1-1 through two innings they erupted for six runs in the top of the third.

Senior right fielder Alexis Anderson, who finished the game 4 for 7 with three RBIs and two runs, led off the inning with a solo shot to left center. Senior center fielder Kayla Fortner drew a walk before catcher Riley Hayes homered to right to put Southeast up 4-1.

Shortstop Taylor McDannold and designated player Claire Wernig each had RBI singles and Anderson pushed the lead to 7-1 with a two-out base hit up the middle.

"I was very happy with the way we came out of the gate, especially after what happened yesterday," Southeast first-year coach Mark Redburn said. "I thought they did a great job knocking out their No. 1 pitcher. The big difference, though, was that I didn't think we took advantage of some opportunities on that No. 2 pitcher. I thought that with the umpire's zone being a little tight we were chasing some pitches a little bit and weren't very selective at the plate. *... We had some more opportunities, but we just didn't get that timely hit."

Panthers designated player Taylor Miokovic singled to start the bottom of the fifth and pinch runner Taylor Monahan scored on a double by third baseman Hannah Rachor, who moved up to third on the throw home. Rachor was driven in on a two-out triple to right-center by first-team all-conference right fielder April Markowski to cut the Redhawks lead to 7-3.

Southeast answered with a pair of runs in the next inning. Fortner, who was hit by a pitch to start the sixth, scored on a two-out single by McDannold. Pinch runner Shelby Eccles scored from second after the throw home popped out of the catcher's glove and extended the lead to 9-3.

The freshman Krumrey issued her only walk of the game to the leadoff batter in the bottom of the inning before giving up a two-run home run to center to Cole to cut it to 9-5. Sophomore pitcher Keaira Schilling relieved Krumrey and allowed three consecutive base hits that plated another run. She struck out the next two batters before being called for an illegal pitch for the second time in the game. The runners moved up a base on the call to score another run before she got the batter to fly out on the next pitch and end the inning with the Redhawks maintaining a 9-7 edge.

"Basically that her pivot foot was leaving so she was re-planting, so that was the thing," Redburn said of the umpire's explanation of the illegal pitches. "I think she's maybe had one or two called all year long and so it's something that we work on, that we're aware of, but she'd only had like one or two. That's what they were saying, and I think that that maybe affected her a little bit. It is what it is."

Southeast was retired in order in the seventh. Schilling was called for her third illegal pitch to run the count full to the leadoff batter in the Panthers' half of the inning before issuing a walk. All-OVC shortstop Bailey O'Dell then singled to left and moved up a base on the throw to third, putting both runners in scoring position when Krumrey re-entered.

Cole sent the second pitch from she saw from Krumrey over a leaping McDannold for the game-tying single. Krumrey struck out the next two batters before Cole was caught stealing second after she slid past the bag to send the game to extra innings.

The Redhawks got back-to-back one-out singles but stranded the runners with a couple of foul outs in the eighth and had one runner reach on a walk in the ninth while the Panthers were retired in order both innings.

Southeast had another opportunity in the 10th when Fortner led off with a double and advanced to third on a fly to center before second-team all-OVC first baseman Lindsey Patterson drew a walk, but both were stranded.

The Panthers put runners on the corners in the 11th after a couple of hits and an error, but Krumrey got O'Dell to line out to third to send the game to the 12th, which set a new tournament record for the longest game.

Anderson led off the 12th with a double to center field and tried to score when Patterson sent a two-out single into left field but was thrown out to end the inning.

"There's two outs so the thing is the runner at second base with two outs you're going two bases unless I stop you," Redburn said. "So at second they should be getting a big lead, they should be going on contact. And as many innings as we had been playing I knew it was going to come down to something. Carp, who was on-deck behind her had struggled a little bit, hit some pop flies, so I want to take a chance.

"At least if we're going to be out I'd rather be out trying to score at the plate. Earlier in the game we had a similar play and the catcher dropped it, so there's a lot of things that have to happen in that case and being so late in the game that it was and Maddie's pitch count -- we're going to take a chance."

Cole delivered the game-winning blow two pitches later.

"I was trying to get ahead in the count because I knew she was a good hitter, she was the one who had done some damage throughout the game so I was trying not to hang anything and I left a curveball kind of flat and she took advantage of it," Krumrey, an all-newcomer selection, said. "She's a good hitter, and good hitters do that".

Krumrey (13-12) allowed six runs, five earned, over 10 innings on 10 hits with four strikeouts and one walk.

"I think Maddie did a great job for us," Redburn said. "Obviously coming out like that and sitting for a couple innings and then trying to come back in that's a very, very difficult thing to do but she kept us in the game and she did all she could do."

The Redhawks finished the season at 19-27.They were 11-34 and 3-20 in conference in Lana Richmond's final season the year before. EIU (21-26) advanced to face the loser of Thursday's game between No. 1 SIUE and No. 4 Tennessee Tech at 10 a.m. Friday in an elimination game.

"We talk about Team 39 and they've done everything that we set out to do and that was to be the building blocks for our future on and off the field, and they did all of those things," Redburn said, referring to it being the 39th team in program history. "If you would've told us at the beginning of the year, 'Hey, you're going to be on the verge of 20 wins, you're going to finish seventh in the conference and get in the conference tournament,' we would have been doing back flips and saying, 'Absolutely.' All that stuff happened so they should have nothing at all to be down about."