Victorian teams prevailed at the 2021 Australian Senior League Championship in Lismore, with Southern Mariners taking home gold and Eastern Athletics securing a bronze-medal finish.
Southern Mariners are Australian Senior League champions for the second time after topping Macarthur in extra innings on Wednesday night.
Otto Moje drove in the go-ahead run in the top of the eighth and Genevieve Beacom shut the door as the Mariners sealed an 8-7 win in the gold medal game at Albert Park Baseball Complex.
GAME CENTRE: Box score and play-by-play
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Tyler Ellis sent the contest to the bottom of the seventh after delivering a two-out, two-run double in the top of the inning.
Moje worked around a lead-off walk to keep Macarthur off the board and send the game to extras. He then delivered with the bat in a lengthy at-bat after Beacom reached on a dropped third strike to start the inning.
Beacom retired all three Macarthur hitters she faced in the bottom of the eighth, including two via strikeouts.
Macarthur took the lead on a two-run error in the bottom of the sixth after Blake Gooding’s single levelled the score, but the Mariners had another comeback in them after earlier overturning a 3-0 deficit.
Macarthur started strongly after a two-plus hour rain delay. Starter Adam Bates set the tone, striking out the Mariners in the top of the first. He was handed a lead in the bottom of the second inning after Koby Chesterton singled and scored on a sacrifice fly from Fynn Bannura.
Christopher Fergie singled to start the bottom of the third and scored on an error ahead of Bates making it 3-0 with an RBI-double. Southern threatened in the top of the fourth and put two runners in scoring position. Ryan Williams singled with two out and Ellis doubled, but Bates used his eighth strikeout of the contest to escape the inning.
The Mariners were able to hit the scoreboard an inning later. Charlie Pierson’s single ignited their fifth-inning rally after Beacom started the frame with a walk. Ryan Langworthy’s ground ball pulled the Mariners in one ahead.
Lachlan Smith’s sacrifice fly and a throwing error allowed Joel Poole and Wesley Ka to score and put Southern up 4-3. The Mariners added a fifth run of the frame on a wild pitch, but the game had a few more twists and turns yet.
Earlier, Victoria’s Eastern Athletics rode a strong offensive performance to a 17-4 mercy-rule win over Cronulla in the bronze medal game.
The Athletics rode regular offence to a 17-4 mercy-rule win over Cronulla on diamond one in the first of two medal games on day five. Eastern shrugged off an extra-inning loss to Southern Mariners in Tuesday night’s second semi-final to start strongly. They scored four times in the top of the first to hand starting pitcher Finley Ronalds-Greatbach a handy lead.
GAME CENTRE: Box score and play-by-play
Cronulla pulled back a pair of runs but the Athletics added one in the second and four in the third to take a 9-2 lead.
They capped off the impressive win with an eight-run fifth.
Campbell Every drove in a game-high three RBIs for Eastern. James Squire and Ronalds-Greatbach each had three hits for the Athletics as the team racked up 15 hits total and gave up just four. Ronalds-Greatbach and Evan Maury combined to not give up an earned run on the mound. Maury struck out six in three impressive relief innings after Ronalds-Greatbach punched out four.
Congratulations to Southern Mariners and Eastern Athletics!
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