Longwood Wins 2019 Big South Softball Championship
For the fifth time in seven seasons, Longwood softball is the Big South champion.
A complete game three-hitter from freshman
Sydney Backstrom and a go-ahead suicide squeeze bunt laid down by senior
Jessica Smith in the bottom of the sixth sent the No. 1 seed Lancers (37-19) to a 3-2 win over No. 4 seed Winthrop (30-26) in the Big South Championship game Saturday afternoon at Amanda Littlejohn Stadium.
The title-game win came in comeback fashion for the Big South regular-season champion Lancers, who scored three runs in the bottom of the sixth to overcome a 2-0 deficit. All-Big South freshman
Sydney Jacobsen scored the go-ahead run after drawing a walk, stealing second and advancing to third on a throwing error on the same play.
Smith placed a one-out bunt down the first base line to send in a charging Jacobsen, who was sent from the third base box by Big South Coach of the Year
Kathy Riley and scored uncontested with a feet-first slide.
Backstrom, whose lone blemish on the day came on a two-run home run by Winthrop senior Keleigh Romine in the top of the fifth, then locked up the win by working around a two-out walk in the top of the seventh to complete her three-hit masterpiece.
The championship win was a redemptive effort that saw the Lancers avenge a 4-3 loss to Winthrop in the first game of the day. The upset-minded Eagles – who knocked off No. 2 seed USC Upstate Friday to reach the championship game – put Longwood in a winner-take-all title game Saturday afternoon after seventh-inning go-ahead double by Brooke Ellis led them to a game-one upset Saturday morning.
All-Tournament Team
Karleigh Donovan, Longwood (MVP)
Sydney Backstrom, Longwood
Bug Batten, Longwood
Jordan Clark, Longwood
Blake Wallert, Winthrop
Morgan Lowers, Winthrop
Kiley Majette, Winthrop
?Christina Biggerstaff, USC Upstate
Brittany Case, USC Upstate
Jessie Marvin, Radford
Sydney Fisher, Radford
Longwood's run of five Big South crowns in seven seasons is now one that has never been matched by any league counterpart. Also the 2019 Big South regular-season champions, the title sweep is the latest accolade in a three-year run that has seen Longwood win every conference series since the 2017 season.
Saturday's championship earns the Lancers the Big South's automatic bid to an NCAA Regional, the location and seeding of which will be announced during the NCAA Selection Show Sunday at 9 p.m. on ESPN2. The NCAA Tournament berth will be the fourth in the past five years for the Lancers, who have advanced to the NCAA Regional Championship game in each of their last two appearances.