GULF SHORES- Needing a win in their losers bracket game against Dale County Friday afternoon, things did not look good for the T.R. Miller Lady Tiger softball team.
Trailing 3-1 in the fifth inning, lightning in the area followed by rains forced a pause in game action for about 45 minutes.
When games resumed, T.R. Miller came off the bus hot scoring four runs in the bottom of the fifth on five hits and stay alive with a 5-3 win over the Lady Warriors of Dale County.
With the win, the Lady Tigers improved to 23-14 and will face familiar area foe Excel this morning at 9:30 a.m. back in Gulf Shores.
A win over the Lady Panthers and T.R. Miller will keep playing. A loss will eliminate the Lady Tigers.
“First off, Taylor Guthrie did a great job for us on the mound,” T.R. Miller Lady Tiger head coach Greg White said. “She came in on short notice has not pitched in about a month and she came in and did a great job. We had some big hits at some big times. I don’t know if the break helped us or not or hurt them, but we came back out and played some good ball after that. We started hitting the ball like we are capable of and put some hits together and scored some runs and had a chance to win it and pulled it out there at the end. Natalie Neal made a great play there at the end to help preserve the win.”
T.R. Miller trailed 1-0 after the first inning, but tied the game up in the bottom of the second.
Dale County added one run in the third inning and one in the fifth before the stoppage of play to claim a 3-1 lead over the Lady Tigers.
T.R. Miller scored four in the bottom of the fifth and held Dale County to no runs with two runners on and got a game-saving catch by Natalie Neal for the third out to win the game by two.
Guthrie pitched for T.R. Miller and went seven innings allowing eight hits, three runs, none earned, walked two and struck out six.
For the Lady Tigers at the plate, Neal and Guthrie were both 1-for-3 with Neal having one RBI.
Emily Waters was 2-for-3 and Audrey Hamric, Takeysia McFugerson and Jessica Allan were all 1-for-3 with Allan having one RBI.

Trinity 13, TRM 6
In their first game of the South softball regionals in Gulf Shores Friday morning, the T.R. Miller Lady Tigers had an inning to forget against the Trinity Lady Wildcats.
The Lady Tigers committed four errors and allowed four hits while Trinity scored eight runs to turn a 1-0 Lady Tiger lead into an 8-1 Trinity lead.
Trinity would used their big first inning to go on and knock off T.R. Miller 13-6 and drop the Lady Tigers into the losers bracket against Dale County.
“We shot ourselves in the foot in the first inning,” White said. “You are down 8-1 after the first inning and you are playing catch up the rest of the game. After that we did OK. We still scattered a few errors. You can scatter a few errors and get away with it sometimes, but when you make as many as we did and get behind, it is hard to battle back. We couldn’t put it together and make a run. We just have to try and regroup and get it together in the next one.”
T.R. Miller (22-14) led 1-0 after the top of the first inning as Taylor Guthrie had an inside-the-park homerun for the Lady Tigers.
After the disastrous bottom of the first, T.R. Miller trailed 8-1 after the first inning.
The Lady Tigers cut the lead to 8-2 in the top of the second but saw Trinity score two of their own to take a 10-2 lead.
T.R. Miller began to scratch their way back into the game in the top of the third inning with three runs to cut the lead to 10-5, but Trinity once again scored one run of their own to take an 11-5 lead.
T.R. Miller would add a late run in the top of the fifth, but Trinity added two in the sixth and went on to win the game by seven, 13-6.
Miranda Smith took the loss on the mound for the Lady Tigers as she went one inning and allowed four hits, eight runs, four earned, walked none, hit and struck out one.
Laurel Billy went the rest of the game and allowed two hits, five runs, none earned, walked two, struck out three and hit four.
At the plate for the Lady Tigers, Leah Brundidge and Natalie Neal were both 1-for-3 with Neal having an RBI.
Guthrie was 2-for-4 with one RBI and Audrey Hamric and Leigh Margaret Bostic were both 1-for-3 with Hamric having two RBIs and Bostic one.
T.R. Miller left three runners on base and made nine errors in the loss while Trinity left seven on base and made one error.
After losing game one, T.R. Miller was playing Dale County in the losers bracket.
The Lady Tigers were losing 3-1 in the fifth inning when the game was suspended for lightning and rain.