Hutchins’ game-winning hit lifts Scottsboro past rival Fort Payne

Story by Jason Bowen

The Scottsboro softball team’s roster features an extreme mix of seniors and underclassmen, with some players still in junior high.

Scottsboro head coach Jeff Campbell said the Wildcats’ roster construction needs strong senior leadership in order to succeed, and they got that Monday.

Three straight seniors reached base before another senior, Jurney Hutchins, delivered the game-winning walk-off RBI single for the Wildcats in a 5-4 victory over rival Fort Payne at Scottsboro High School.

“We needed senior leadership to win game like that, and that’s exactly happened,” Campbell said. “That was four seniors getting it done, four seniors in a row to finish that thing off.”

Scottsboro (3-2) built a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the third inning. Ava Grace Long reached on a Fort Payne error to start the inning, and following Ali Jones’ sacrifice bunt, Fort Payne made a throwing error trying to cut down Long going to third base, allowing Long to score the game’s first run. Addyson Crumbly then walked and scored on Morgan Perkins’ RBI single — Perkins was playing her first game of the season after helping Scottsboro win the Class 5A Girls Basketball state title two days earlier — and Perkins scored on fellow Northeast Alabama Community College softball signee Austin McNeece’s RBI triple.

Three straight singles in the top of the fourth helped Fort Payne (1-7) pull to within 3-2, but Scottsboro added a run in the bottom of the fourth when Long led off the inning with a double, moved to third base on Jones’ ground out and scored on a wild pitch. But Fort Payne tied the game in the sixth on Cory Kramer’s RBI double and Josie Smith’s RBI groundout.

Scottsboro stranded two runners in the bottom of the sixth, and after SHS pitcher Anna Clair Crocker retired Fort Payne in order in the top of the seventh, McNeece doubled on a shallow fly ball to start the bottom of the seventh for the Wildcats, and Fort Payne intentionally walked Shila Wadkins and Lana Emanuel to load the bases.

Hutchins, hitless for the game thus far, then came to the plate and lined an RBI single over the head of the drawn-in Fort Payne center fielder to plate McNeece with the winning run.

It was Hutchins’ first career walk-off hit.

“It feels amazing,” Hutchins said. “I got up there the first two (at-bats) and it wasn’t good. But you have to have confidence up there. That type of stuff brings your confidence up. I was very happy when I was running to first base.”

McNeece finished 2-for-4 with a double and a triple and Crumbly was 2-for-2 with a double for Scottsboro while Perkins and Hutchins had one hit and one RBI each, Wadkins singled and walked twice and Jones and Long had one hit each.

Crocker got the win in the circle, pitching six innings in all and recorded three strikeouts. Adriana Colon entered the circle midway through the game and pitched one inning total while recording two strikeouts.

“It was a closer than I would’ve liked, but that was a big-time win for us,” Campbell said. “We found a way to win.”