LADY EAGLES STATE BOUND!
Holliday Lady Eagles punch ticket to Austin
For the first time in program history, the Holliday Lady Eagles are headed to the state tournament.
Needing to win two games on Saturday to keep the season alive, Holliday showed up when it mattered most, taking down Jacksboro 10-3 and 4-0 to win the 3A Region I Final in Graham on Saturday, May 29.
Holliday 4
— Archer County News Sports (@ACNSports) May 30, 2021
Jacksboro 0
Final (HHS wins series 2-1)
Lady Eagles are state bound! pic.twitter.com/0xnC1EjXLc
“This is ingrained in us,” Holliday head coach Billy Arbogast said of his team’s resilience after dropping game one. “We’re Holliday; we win things. That’s what we do. We don’t give up. This isn’t the biggest stage these kids have been on. Credit to the runs they made in volleyball and basketball. We’re just trying to go out and play our game.”
Holliday (38-2) makes its first trip to Red & Charline McCombs Field on the campus of the University of Texas for the Class 3A semifinal matchup at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, June 2, against Region III's Diboll (34-5). Should the Lady Eagles win on Wednesday, they would play for the state championship on Thursday, June 3, at 1 p.m.
Rains (36-1) out of Region II and Bishop (30-3-2) out of Region IV meet in the first semifinal at 10 a.m.
The Lady Eagles certainly didn’t make it easy on themselves.
In game one on Thursday, May 27, Holliday committed six errors resulting in eight unearned runs in a 14-3 run-rule loss to fall behind 1-0 in the series against the Tigerettes. Freshman Kinley Marek provided the lone bright spot for the Lady Eagles, blasting her second homer of the year and driving in another run in a 2-for-2 effort.
But much like the regular season meetings between these two squads, Holliday had an answer and won it when it mattered.
It took Holliday a little while to get going in game two on Saturday, but once the offense found a rhythm, there was no slowing it down.
After gifting Jacksboro a pair of unearned runs in the third and fourth innings, the Lady Eagles’ sticks came alive in the bottom of the fifth to turn a 2-0 deficit into a 6-2 lead.
Payton Murray worked a leadoff walk, Abby Turner singled through the right-side of the infield and Marek drew a walk to load the bags with no outs. Taylor Gillit smoked a single past the Jacksboro first baseman. An ill-advised throw from first to third on the play allowed Salem Henry (running for Turner) and Marek to score with Gillit moving up to third. Sydney Linn worked a walk before coming around to score on another Tigerette error while stealing second.
Holliday would go on to add four more in the sixth to take the momentum into game three.
The rubbermatch turned into the Addison Lindemann show.
The Lady Eagles’ fireballer didn’t run up gaudy strikeout numbers like usual. She didn’t need to. With her ability to rely on her defense, Lindemann scattered five hits and a walk while holding the Tigerettes’ offense scoreless.
Her biggest impact came at the plate, however. After Linn lined a single into center with one out in the bottom of the third, Lindemann launched Alex Holman’s 1-2 offering into orbit for a two-run, no-doubt, homer to stake the Lady Eagles the lead for good.
After Jacksboro gifted Holliday another pair of runs on a Gillit little league homer, Lindemann never gave the Tigerettes a chance to get back in it.
With two outs in the top of the seventh, Lindemann induced an infield popup to shortstop Bree Zellers before being mobbed in the circle as the Lady Eagles clinched their trip to Austin.
“I thought Thursday we let it creep in to our heads that ‘we’ve never been here’ and it shell-shocked us,” Arbogast said. “This is a team that got together and worked really hard. It’s not a coaching thing. It’s just them working together and being a part of a community that has their back 100%.”
As this team has showed, if they can continue to play together and play for each other in the next two games, they’ll be headed back to Holliday with a little gold.
