Addison Gookin, Lauren Swartzendruber are late-game hitting heroes for Mount Vernon softball

OXFORD — Lauren Swartzendruber was due. And she was ready.

“She came up, and I told her, ‘It’s your time,’” Mount Vernon softball coach Robin Brand. “It was a big moment, and she was ready for it.”

Swartzendruber delivered a two-run sixth-inning single to put Mount Vernon ahead for good in the second game, and the Class 3A second-ranked Mustangs completed a Wamac Conference doubleheader sweep of 4A No. 8 Clear Creek Amana, 1-0 and 6-4, Wednesday night at McAreavy Field.

“We talk about flushing (the past),” said Swartzendruber, who was 0-for-5 with four strikeouts heading into her big, final opportunity. “I knew Coach had full faith in me, and so did my team.”

The Mustangs (29-4, 20-2 Wamac) led the nightcap 3-0 early before CCA (27-8, 18-6) rallied for a 4-3 lead behind a two-run single by Gabrielle Bedford and a solo home run by Avery Allen.

Mount Vernon’s winning response came with two outs. Ashlyn Steen singled, then Addison Gookin — the hero of Game 1 — followed with another. After a wild pitch advanced both runners, Swartzendruber delivered to put the Mustangs in front, 5-4.

Swartzendruber recently returned to the lineup as a designated player; she had been a catcher early in the season before suffering a concussion when she took a foul tip of her mask.

“Our team chemistry is great,” she said. “Somebody needed to make a big play, and we have full faith in each other.”

Lilly See added an insurance run with a single, and the Mustangs held on after CCA got two runners aboard with one out in the bottom of the seventh.

The opener was scoreless until the top of the seventh. Jenna Sprague was hit in the elbow by the first pitch of the seventh inning. After a pair of flyouts, Gookin laced an 0-2 pitch into the right-center field gap for a triple, and courtesy runner Avery Plathe scored from first base.

“You have to have full confidence that you’re going to hit it square,” Gookin said. “Everybody from 1 through 9 can get big hits for us.”

Gookin batted seventh Wednesday, Swartzendruber hit eighth.

“You never know who’s going to step up,” Brand said.

Both pitchers were tremendous in the first game. Sprague (20-2) scattered three hits — just one in the final five innings — striking out 10 and walking two.

CCA’s Ashley Webb (17-5) allowed five hits, fanned eight and walked one.

Bedford reached base six times in seven plate appearances, including a double in the sixth inning of Game 1 that missed leaving the yard by 3 feet.

MOUNT VERNON 1-6, CLEAR CREEK AMANA 0-4

At Oxford

Game 1

Mount Vernon 000 000 1 — 1 5 1

Clear Creek Amana 000 000 0 — 0 3 0

Jenna Sprague and Kenna Rollinger. Ashley Webb and Katelyn LeFleur. W — Sprague (19-2). L — Webb (17-4).

Game 2

Mount Vernon 102 003 0 — 6 11 0

Clear Creek Amana 003 100 0 — 4 9 2

Addison Gookin, Jenna Sprague (4) and Kenna Rollinger. Ashley Webb and Katelyn LeFleur. W — Sprague (20-2). L — Webb (17-5). HR — CCA: Avery Allan (3).

Comments: jeff.linder@thegazette.com