Clippers’ streak snapped

May 5, 2015 at 12:05a.m.

Cope’s walk-off double powers Crestview win

EAST FAIRFIELD

One of the Crestview High School softball team’s smallest players in stature delivered the biggest hit of the season.

A steady rain fell in the bottom of the seventh inning as Bri Cope stepped into the batter’s box for the fourth time against Columbiana’s unbeaten ace Madison Macklin.

Just as Rebels pitcher Autumn Lindsay had struggled with wet balls in the top of the frame, Macklin’s control was evaporating. She walked Carly Diedrich on four pitches, then threw a wild pitch to send Diedrich to second base.

Macklin found the strike zone with her 2-0 offering to Cope and the Rebels shortstop hit the ball over left fielder Elise Hammond for her second consecutive double and the game-winning RBI in Crestview’s 6-5 victory over Columbiana.

The loss was the Clippers’ first of the season, snapping an 18-game winning streak.

“That could have been the worst hitting game we’ve had in four years, based on how hard we hit,” Columbiana head coach Jerry Beltempo said, noting that his team built leads of 3-0 and 5-3 with the help of several bloop hits. “Crestview is a good team. We just made far too many mistakes.”

Asked how difficult it was seeing the pitches as the rain fell, Cope said, “Extremely hard. I had to focus intensely because the rain was just pelting me in the eyes.”

With seven homers, Cope set the Rebels’ record this season.

“I have never wanted something more in my entire life,” Cope said of the win after the archrivals played for the first time in two seasons. “It is a great feeling — this was our most important game of the season.”

It might not take very long for their next meeting. There’s a strong possibility of a rematch in two weeks. Columbiana (18-1) is the top seed in the Division IV district tournament at Western Reserve High School. The Rebels (13-5) are the second seed.

For Beltempo, it’s the second time he’s had a team win its first 18 games. The first time was in 1988 in his first season as Fitch’s head coach. The Falcons won their 16 regular-season games and five tournament contests before losing in a Division I regional final.

Beltempo agreed that teaching moments can be produced when the first loss is a heartbreaker.

“Maybe this will be a good thing,” he said. “Our kids have been playing tight the last five games, thinking about [the streak]. It comes at a bad time, but you have to give Crestview credit, they made a couple of more plays.”

Lindsay, who earned the win after escaping the seventh inning by stranding three Clippers, said she tried to keep her pitching hand dry by putting it under her sleeve.

“My defense played great,” Lindsay said. “I couldn’t ask for a better win.”

Bloop singles by Lauren Schlueter, Danyelle McMaster and Haley Tohm helped give the Clippers a 3-0 lead. The Rebels responded with a run in the third inning and two in the fourth for a 3-3 tie, with Lindsay Balmenti’s double and Lindsay’s and Tristen Huff’s singles being key hits.

Infield singles by Hammond and Tohm set up Macklin’s two-out, bases-loaded single in the fifth inning for a 5-3 lead.

Cope doubled and scored on Balmenti’s single in the fifth inning. In the next frame Brittany Coblentz bunted her way on base and scored on Mackenzie Daub’s double.

“Our girls have been in a slump,” Rebels head coach Clarence Sickelsmith said. “We’re starting to pick it up.”