Escanaba Major Girls Eliminated In State Quarters

ST. CLAIR, Mich.---The Escanaba Major Girls (age 11-12) Little League softball team lost to St. Clair, 9-4, in the state quarterfinals on Monday, at Legacy Field. Escanaba gave up three runs in each of the final two innings as the host team picked up the victory.

The loss ended an impressive run for Escanaba, which went undefeated through the entire All-Star season. St. Clair later lost its state semifinal game to Bay County, 10-4.

"It's a game of errors, and we were the ones making the errors," Escanaba Coach Too Milkiewicz said. "That's the way it goes. It's part of the game. And they (St. Clair) played a good game. They player better than us, cleaner than us. And they hit the ball. They made plays when they needed to. We didn't."

St. Clair got the leadoff batter on base in every single inning against Escanaba ace McKayla Mott.

The District Seven champions were aggressive on the bases, taking a page out of Escanaba's playbook by scoring two runs on a sacrifice bunt.

Trailing 1-0 right off the bat, Escanaba scored in the bottom of the first inning when Paxton Bullen walked and Mott was hit by a pitch.

A passed ball moved both of them up, and Izzy Braun put down a nice bunt. Bullen scored, and Mott also tried to score but was tagged out shy of the plate.

Milkiewicz agrued that the third baseman obstructed Mott as she rounded third, but the umpires ruled otherwise.

A long delay while Escanaba protested changed nothing.

In the bottom of the second inning, Escanaba trailed 2-1 when Aubrey Stropich led off with an infield hit and stole both second and third base. With one out, Maddy Fulsher came through with a base hit to tie the game at 2-2.

Ana Boutillier followed with a base hit, but with two on base, the next two Escanaba girls made outs.

Escanaba got out of a bases-loaded-no-outs jam in the fourth inning unscathed, but the fifth and sixth innings were disasterous, as several errors combined with solid St. Clair hitting spelled the end of the Escanaba state championship dreams.

Escanaba's last gasp was in the bottom of the fifth inning when they scored twice to cut the deficit to 6-4, as DelaneyMcIntyre walked and Carley Mcinerney beat out a bunt single. Both scored on groundouts, which St. Clair gladly granted to get outs.

St. Clair put the game away with three unearned runs in the top of the sixth inning.

Julia Schweihofer led the way for the Saints with two hunt singles and a sacrifice bunt. Claire Borg was the winning pitcher, and also had an RBI single.

Click the thumbnails in the ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS box above to see photos, videos taken by Caron Salo. Thank you for everything all week long!