WELLS — When she heard the crack of the bat, Christina LeBlanc’s heart sank.
With two runners on, two outs and her team down by a run in the seventh inning, the Wells senior represented her team’s last hope against Falmouth on Monday, one that looked extinguished when her short pop up down the first base line looked like a sure out.
“I was thinking,” LeBlanc recalled, “”˜It’s done, and I was the last out. The last chance.’”
But LeBlanc got a reprieve as the ball nipped off the edge of pitcher Julia Treadwell’s glove and fell harmlessly to the ground, an official pardon in the form of a foul ball.
“When she dropped it,” LeBlanc said, “I knew I had to get it the second time.”
LeBlanc made sure the second chance didn’t go to waste two pitches later, when she cracked a waist-high Treadwell fastball on a line into center field to plate two runs and give the Warriors an 8-7 walk-off victory in a seesaw Western Maine Conference softball game at Wells High School.
LeBlanc had fouled off several Treadwell fastballs during the at-bat, including the one that could have been out three, before squaring up one she could handle. The ball skipped off the wet grass and past onrushing Yachtsmen center fielder Krysia Lesniak, allowing Sophie Lamb to come all the way around from first for the winning run.
“I was waiting for the unexpected,” LeBlanc said of the at-bat. “I just really wanted to smack one, no matter what kind of pitch it was.”
It was the second nail-biter in five days between the two teams. Wells (10-1) had won a 5-2, 14-inning pitchers’ duel last Thursday in Falmouth (7-3) as Treadwell and Warriors pitcher Lauren Bame went toe-to-toe, giving up just one run each through 12 innings.
Four days later, the batters had the upper hand as the teams combined for 21 hits, including three home runs. But once again, it was Wells finding a way to win late.
“That was a great game, and we just never said quit,” Wells coach Kevin Fox said. “Christina came up huge. She’s our seven-hole hitter but she can hit. We’ve got some depth, and that’s a good thing to have.”
Good fortune isn’t a bad thing to have either, and the Warriors had plenty of it Monday as LeBlanc’s was the last of three Falmouth drops in the drizzly conditions that led to five of Wells’ runs.
With the Yachtsmen up 4-2 after scoring four times in the top of the third, Wells had a runner on first with one out in the bottom of the inning when Bame hit a pop up that was dropped by shortstop Maddie Rouhana. The Warriors went on to score three runs in the inning, two on Meg Young’s two-out single, to take a 5-4 lead.
After Falmouth had retaken the lead 7-5 thanks to fifth-inning home runs by Rouhana and Elizabeth Walker, Jordan Agger got Wells back within a run with a solo home run of her own leading off the bottom of the inning. Agger’s big fly over the left-field fence came one pitch after a much shorter ball in the air wasn’t handled in foul territory by Falmouth third baseman Amanda Carver.
Despite giving up the two home runs, Bame buckled down and kept the Warriors in the game, getting a pair of strike outs with runners on second and third to get out of the fifth and then working scoreless innings in the sixth and seventh to keep her team within touching distance.
“Lauren’s given up four home runs in the last two games, and she’s the first one smacking her glove and shaking it off,” Fox said. “She has that toughness to say, ”˜All right, you got me that time, bring on the next batter.’ That’s a great attitude to have because some people would just shut down for the rest of the game.”
Bame’s efforts extended into the bottom of the seventh, which she led off by drawing a walk. After Agger popped out, Lamb singled to put runners on first and second before Young also popped out, setting up LeBlanc to light the late fireworks.
“We wanted this win,” LeBlanc said. “The whole team has big hearts, and we just came together and said, ”˜We’re so close, let’s go win this.’ We all have that mentality of really wanting to win, and we knew we had to rally.”
— Staff Writer Cameron Dunbar can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 323 or cdunbar@journaltribune.com.
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