Emma Clarke’s walk-off homer moves the Lady Vols to the national semifinals
OKLAHOMA CITY — Tennessee softball returned to Devon Park Saturday to take on the Texas Tech Red Raiders for a place in the NCAA Women’s College World Series semifinals. Emma Clarke walked off with a solo home run in the bottom of the ninth to seal a 2-1 win for the Lady Vols.
“Just so much joy, I had so many thoughts,” Clarke said afterward. “But I immediately just looked up and started to give God all the glory because I’m so grateful to be in this position, to be on this team with these people, to be able to have opportunities to be in moments like this, even when they don’t work out. It’s literally such a blessing. I just couldn’t do it without the girls to my left and right.”
Karlyn Pickens threw 6.2 innings of one-run ball on five hits and recorded six strikeouts with three walks on 108 pitches. Sage Mardjetko threw 2.1 innings in relief and allowed no hits and struck out two, with two walks issued.
Taelyn Holley put the Lady Vols up with a solo home run in the bottom of the fifth inning. Taylor Pannell scored on a sacrifice fly in the top of the seventh inning to tie the game at one apiece, and that score held up til the ninth.
Pickens opened the game and won the first battle with a leadoff strikeout of Mia Williams. After allowing a hit to Mihyia Davis, she made it through the inning clean and struck out Jasmyn Burns for the third out.
Kaitlyn Terry got the start for the Red Raiders. Sophia Knight, who came in hitting .406, beat out a leadoff single. Terry bounced back with a strikeout of Elsa Morrison and proceeded through the inning clean.
Pickens’ change of speed and location looked to be a challenge for Texas Tech early on, and the defense behind her was a solid wall. Clarke made a great diving catch at second to retire Lagi Quiroga during the top of the third inning.
Bella Faw recorded the second hit of the day for the Lady Vols to lead off the bottom of the third. After moving over via a Holley sacrifice bunt, Terry put Knight on via a hit by pitch to bring Morrison to the plate.
Texas Tech head coach Gerry Glasco made the move to NiJaree Canady with two on and one out, and got Morrison to foul out. Ella Dodge put up a fight with Canady, and after runners moved up on a wild pitch, Canady lost the battle with a hit by pitch to load the bases with two outs.
Tennessee had the moment to strike with Clarke at the plate. After falling behind 0-2, Clarke worked the count full and popped out to first. The Lady Vols missed a great opportunity to jump ahead.
Pickens remained in the zone and induced a lot of weak contact that didn’t leave the infield. That gave the defense behind her many chances to make great plays, and they accepted the challenge. Both Clarke and Dodge were on top of everything that came their way.
“Emma Clarke, just like a ball magnet,” Pickens said after. “Every ball hit her way, she’s going to field, they’re going to make a play. I think that just gives us the most confidence to be able to throw our pitches right in the zone knowing our defense is going to be there to make the plays. Gives us a lot of confidence.”
Tennessee put a leadoff runner on in the bottom of the fourth when Alannah Leach reached on a fielding error by Hailey Toney, but a strikeout, a caught stealing and a stranded single ended the threat.
The game moved to the fifth and still held zeros on the board for both teams. Pitching and defense ruled this game, and it seemed that Tennessee had more of the upper hand there, even though neither team had broken through.
Pickens and the Lady Vols’ defense had only allowed one hit until Lauren Allred’s two-out single to left in the fifth. Pickens responded with a strikeout of Canady to shut the Red Raiders down.
Pickens had an efficient day and, through five innings, had only allowed two hits while striking out four with no walks. After the game, Glasco took responsibility for his team’s lack of readiness for Pickens.
“I got to give Pickens credit,” Glasco said. “I got to take some blame on this as an offensive coach. Obviously, I didn’t have my team ready to come out and face Karlyn Pickens. She was really good. We kept getting on top of the ball instead of inside the ball on the drop ball. We didn’t make that adjustment.”
Glasco spoke to the amount of hitting reps the Red Raiders took over the day prior to Saturday’s game, but it still wasn’t enough.
“We hit yesterday morning,” Glasco said. “We hit yesterday evening. We hit this morning. We had three batting sessions to get ready to hit against Pickens. We were hitting too many groundballs. We weren’t getting the ball where we wanted it. We were hitting it in the air. Weren’t hitting it as hard as we wanted to hit.”
Canady began the bottom of the fifth with a mistake, and Holley took advantage with her sixth home run of the season to put the Lady Vols up 1-0. Canady would get out of the inning without any further damage, but in this game, that was huge.
Williams had been quiet, but in the top of the sixth, she smacked a one-out double to left-center for her first hit. Then, on a Davis single to center, Knight threw out Williams at home to wipe the Red Raiders’ shot at tying the game.
Morrison was in the right spot and did a fantastic job of making sure the tag was applied.
Texas Tech picked up on Pickens as she approached 80 pitches and worked into a two-on, two-out situation after Jackie Lis worked a walk. However, Pickens escaped the inning after a Burns pop-out.
After the Lady Vols failed to reach during the bottom half, Pickens returned to try to finish the deal, but ran into Pannell for a leadoff single. Then, Terry worked a walk to put two on with no outs.
Pickens had thrown 98 pitches and received a visit from both coach Karen Weekly and coach Megan Rhodes Smith. Right out of the timeout, Pannell stole third to put runners on the corners, and the Red Raiders were 60 feet away from tying the game.
Then, after Terry stole second, Allred was issued an intentional walk to load the bases with no outs. Pickens then bounced back with a strikeout of Quiroga.
A huge moment of the game came when Desirae Spearman lined out to center, and Pannell tagged up from third. Knight threw a dart to home, and Morrison appeared to have completed the tag to end the game.
However, replay review showed that she missed the tag, and the Red Raiders tied the game at one apiece with two outs in the top of the seventh. Pickens turned the ball over to Mardjetko with runners on second and third with two outs, and Williams worked a walk to load the bases.
Al. Leach made another defensive highlight play for the Lady Vols as she robbed the Red Raiders of a chance to take the lead with a diving catch in left. Tennessee’s defense did everything in its power to win this game.
Terry returned to the circle for the Red Raiders and retired the Lady Vols in order. The game moved on to the eighth inning. Lis worked a leadoff walk to put the go-ahead run on for Texas Tech, but the Lady Vols would get through the side without any damage.
Tennessee was at the top of the order at the bottom of the eighth, and Terry moved right on through, including back-to-back strikeouts of Morrison and Dodge. It looked as if this game was back in its pitcher’s duel state, and neither team could buy a hit.
Mardjetko and the Lady Vols retired the Red Raiders in order, sending the game to the bottom of the ninth. Mardjetko picked up the second strikeout of her outing to Logan Holleman.
Then to top it all off in the bottom of the ninth, Clarke walked it off to deep center to send the Lady Vols to the national semifinals on Monday. This team continues to find ways to win.
“I think the key word, you just said it, is ‘grit’,” Weekly said. “We have won in different ways all season long. I think that allows you to stay emotionally calm and stable and not be going up and down, up and down with how the game’s playing out. That was the thing I was most impressed with us today.”
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