Opponents couldn’t ignore any part of the Lady Panthers this season.

Centralia vs Oak Grove Photo Gallery

Centralia vs Blair Oaks Photo Gallery

Centralia softball had one of its best seasons come to an end in Saturday’s Class 3 MSHSAA championship game at Killian Softball Complex in Springfield with an 8-3 loss to state No. 6 Oak Grove, securing the program’s first state trophy since the 2016 state championship team. The No. 1 Lady Panthers closed with a 29-4 record to match the win total of that team as well.

Oak Grove (25-9) scored six runs on four hits in the seventh inning to break a tie at 2 to improve on its third-place state finish from a year ago that resulted with a 3-2 loss to champion Fatima. After the team’s first loss in 15 games, head coach Liz Bostick pointed to the massive Centralia crowd to let her players know the support they had about three hours away from home. That’s all credited to the type of team they were.

“We play this to build friendships, and we play this to have a family,” Bostick said. “I put my kids in it to build camaraderie and build mental toughness. That’s absolutely what we’ve done all season.”

Centralia also built quite the body of work, taking a 14-game winning streak into the championship game along with eight straight shutouts and three straight no-hitters by Jaylynn Brown. The Lady Panthers defeated back-to-back all-state pitchers in Winfield’s Maci Knowles and Blair Oaks’ Ava Willson just to reach Munson and Oak Grove on Saturday. 

All of those accomplishments happen for a reason, specifically because of how the Lady Panthers back each other up. Behind the sub-1.00 ERA of Brown lies the leading RBI hitters of Madi Johnson and Cora King but also a wealth of contributors. Senior Tilly Fox had a two-RBI hit Friday against Blair Oaks and then fellow senior Bailey Schuering went 2-for-3 with a RBI against Oak Grove.

“Don’t discount one through nine,” Bostick said. “You don't know what night anybody is going to hit, and they pick each other up.”

Schuering finished tied with Brown for third on the team in RBI and gave Centralia a 2-1 lead at the time on a two-out RBI single up the middle.

“She’s been struggling for several weeks,” Bostick said. “She’s had a rough couple of months. For her to come through today in her senior year and last game in softball, the sport she absolutely loves, and to come out 2-for-3, kudos to that kid.”

Schuering said the support was there for everybody on the team all year no matter the role someone had in the program. Every role hence every player was important.

“This has definitely been the best season that I’ve been part of,” Schuering said “There was never really a time that we were arguing with each other. We were always laughing and cheering each other up.”

Other seniors on the team agree wholeheartedly that this is the most fun they’ve had playing softball. After the lineup, Fox said Centralia’s lineup from top to bottom is “the strongest lineup in the state” due to how anybody could come through and how the team could bounce back from mistakes.

“I’ve been playing softball for lots and lots of years and have been on lots of different teams,” Fox said. “I can very confidently say that this is the best thing I’ve ever been a part of and is the closest team I’ve ever been a part of.”

Claire Brinkman said the players like each other and complement each other well emotionally rather than just on the diamond. The talent is there to back up any mistakes but so is the positive nature.

“We all can play a part in this game,” Brinkman said. “You’ll have a few people in the lineup who are down and then you have other people who are able to pick it up. It just goes off and on. Everybody is there to pick up everybody.”

Claire Korb said she and everybody else did their part and continued to do that so that fun being together could result in more fun in victory.

“I’m proud of how much we’ve grown as a team,” Korb said. “At the start of the season, really none of us thought we would be here. I’m just proud of how far we’ve made it.”

At different moments of Saturday’s championship game, the Lady Panthers came together in the circle with the sophomore Brown. Even though she and Centralia have kept putting up zeroes, Brown has guided the Lady Panthers through tense moments with her arm and her teammates have been there to guide her with their words. 

The seventh inning got away from Brown against Oak Grove on a day she still struck out 11 and allowed only six hits but was just part of an obvious all-state campaign. Brown set school records such as strikeouts in a game with 19 and strikeouts in a season with 331 and pitched Centralia to 16 shutout victories and five no-hitters. And, as Bostick said should be emphasized, Brown has two more seasons left.

“She sacrificed a lot of time that has been put into this sport, and it shows,” Bostick said. “The amount of growth she has had in one year, I’ve never seen a kid have that kind of growth. You kind of feel bad as a coach or as a team of being like, ‘Hey, we’re putting this pressure on you every single game. You know that it’s on you.’ But she knows she has a great defense behind her.”

One such instance that allows Brown to be so confident happened the inning before Schuering’s go-ahead single in the fourth inning. A day after going 2-for-3 in a 4-0 win over Blair Oaks (15-20), the second baseman Claire Page made an over-the-shoulder catch just within fair territory that sent her tumbling from the momentum. One might think she looked like a gymnast on that play.

“She used to be a gymnast,” Bostick said. “She’s just an athletic kid. I think she wanted to make it look cool.” 

Bostick said Centralia softball has had no shortage of good teams and kids over the years that came together to win district titles, conference titles and state titles. She told this year’s girls that this was one of her favorite teams. 

“To have 26 kids that genuinely have good hearts and are good people and come out here every single day, I wouldn’t trade them for any team in Missouri,” Bostick said. “Besides the title of mom, the title of coach is who I am. These kids make me proud.”