In Centralia’s first two meetings with Hallsville this season, it was a matter of how the Lady Panthers would stop the Lady Indians. On Thursday, it was a matter of how the Lady Indians would stop Kaelyn Walters.

The Centralia pitcher completed seven innings while holding top-seeded Hallsville’s thunderous offense to two hits and one run — the least the Lady Indians scored since Sept. 10 against Monroe City — to lead the Lady Panthers to a 4-1 victory.

The Lady Panthers will appear in the Class 3 District 4 championship game against No. 3 Father Tolton (24-11) at 11 a.m. today at Nathan A. Toalson Bicentennial Park in Centralia. The offense combined for 13 hits in 7-2 and 5-2 losses against Hallsville this year but finished with seven hits and a three-run sixth inning.

Ellie Page was an automatic baserunner for Centralia (18-13) as she finished 3-for-3 with an RBI and a hit by pitch that scored in the sixth. Madi Johnson followed that with an RBI, and Jaelyn Vega picked up a sacrifice fly to follow her bases-clearing double to win the game Wednesday against Southern Boone.

Head coach Liz Bostick said Hallsville (22-4) does pride itself on offense, as the Lady Indians had three home runs in the first two games, but Walters only allowed three balls to leave the infield — two of them being recorded as outs. The two hits are a season-low for her in games she completed.

“My pitcher threw phenomenal,” Bostick said. “She hit spots, she threw offspeed, she hit spin. This is one of the best games she’s had all season. They hardly got anything out of the infield, and that’s huge because they pride themselves on being really good hitters.”

After Page made Hallsville’s Brianne Wildenhain pay for a leadoff walk with a two-out RBI single in the first inning, Kristen Jones led off Hallsville’s first inning with a single and Madysen Lucas walked to break a 14-inning streak for Walters without issuing a walk. Walters induced two weak-contact outs for the scoreless inning and didn’t walk another Lady Indian the rest of the game to begin a six-inning streak.

Walters needed 87 pitches to dispatch of Hallsville, throwing 58 of them for strikes. She struck out four and notched two of them in the seventh inning, showcasing offspeed stuff the Lady Indians were swinging over.

“I think the biggest thing is she hit spots today,” Bostick said. “The offspeed really kept them off balance and really just making the ball spin. I think they felt a lot of pressure to get hits instead of just allowing them to hit.”

The Lady Panthers were pressured to tally more hits after Hallsville tied the game at 1 in the third inning on a double play turned by second baseman Madi Johnson, who secured the ground ball before tagging the passing runner and throwing to first base to put a damper on a bases-loaded, no-outs threat. Still, Centralia had four hits after five innings, and Wildenhain had struck out seven of her 10 with one out in the sixth inning.

Page was hit by a pitch after hitting singles her first two times up, and that was costly for Hallsville. Slap-hitter Tilly Fox was two of those strikeouts and was quickly down 0-2 in her third at-bat. On the fourth pitch after the second strike, Fox slapped a single to left field that was rolled past the outfielder to the fence, scoring Page. Johnson tripled to the opposite field before sliding into third base and pouncing up for a celebratory yell toward the Lady Panther dugout.

“It takes a little bit of an adjustment (against Wildenhain),” Bostick said. “It changes your eye plane when you’re looking at (her delivery). For (Fox), it was just a matter of adjusting to where the ball was going to be released at."

Page picked up her seventh multi-hit game of the season and her third game with at least three hits — the first since her four Sept. 29 at Clark County.

“(Page) is one of those kids that steps up onto the plate, and she’s just looking to put the ball in play,” Bostick said. “She doesn’t feel a lot of pressure. She just comes out and plays. She’s just got nerves of steel, and she is that kid you want to see succeed so badly because she just comes up and does the job. That’s been her all season.”

After toppling two state-ranked or previously state-ranked foes in the tournament, Centralia is guaranteed to play another this morning in eighth-ranked Tolton. Bostick said the Lady Panthers are ready to play anybody after Thursday’s confidence booster.

“Our word this year is mentality,” Bostick said. “Stay in the moment and present in the moment and enjoy the process and understand one bad thing doesn’t lead to two or three or four. My kids really honed into that saying and did that tonight. We were up by 1 and they tie us, and usually, that’s when we think, ‘Oh, it’s Hallsville. We should let them win.’ They just fought, fought and fought.”

Vega's big double lifts Centralia in 7-4  district win vs Southern Boone

Centralia was looking for the big hit Wednesday.

The Lady Panthers already had a two-RBI home run by Meredith Wright to tie the game and a go-ahead RBI single by Tilly Fox, but they needed a hit that allowed the No. 5 seed to take control of the first-round Class 3 District 4 Tournament game against No. 4 Southern Boone. Jaelyn Vega came through with two outs in the fifth inning to clear the bases and give Centralia a five-run lead that held for a 7-4 victory. 

The Lady Eagles (15-11) had the home field advantage after the game was moved to Ashland due to wet field conditions in Centralia and amped the crowd up even more early after Sydney Turner hit a leadoff home run. Both teams would go hitless against Southern Boone’s Paige Cruzan and Centralia Kaelyn Walters until the third inning, when the Lady Eagles strung together three straight singles. Southern Boone extended the lead to 2-0 on a sacrifice fly, but Walters escaped the jam.

Harper Sontheimer had a leadoff single in the fourth to precede Wright’s home run in the fourth inning. Ellie Page’s double then scored on a pop fly error hit by Vega to give Centralia a 3-2 lead. 

Cruzan pitched into a base-loaded situation in the fifth inning, giving up a single to Jozelynn Bostick and walking Sontheimer before intentionally walking Wright. Fox gave the Lady Panthers a one-run cushion with her single on the fifth pitch of her at-bat. Vega, on the other hand, wasn’t waiting in the two-out pressure situation as she doubled to left field for a 7-2 Centralia lead.

Following that double, the final Lady Panthers were retired while balls hit by Southern Boone’s Cruzan and Emilee DeHaas in the fifth inning cut the lead to 7-4. Centralia had two errors and a hit by pitch in the inning, but Walters sat down eight of the final nine Lady Eagles to clinch the win.

Walters had a final line of two earned runs on seven hits and three strikeouts. She also didn’t walk anyone to extend her streak of innings without a walk to 14, which followed her streak of five games with multiple walks surrendered.

Cross country

Centralia sweeps home meet, Bostick wins second straight race

The Centralia cross country was already running with confidence after each of the teams and Jozelynn Bostick won a conference title.

About a week after that, the Centralia boys and girls swept the team awards Tuesday at the Centralia Invitational, winning with 22 and 23 points, respectively. Bostick won the girls 5,000 meters with a season-best time of 19:25 and was one of three Centralia girls in the top five and four in the top 10. JR Lesher took second in the boys 5,000 meters with a time of 16:54.1, making him one of three Centralia boys in the top five and four in the top 10 and breaking his own school record.

Bostick held off teammate Kenedee Moss, who ran a time of 19:54.3, to win on a windy and rainy day amongst 67 other runners. Among the other Centralia girls who finished in the top 20 to medal was Shelby Lewis with a fourth-place time of 20:39.4, Annie Robinson with a sixth-place time of 21:33.1 and Rylee Palmer with a 14th-place time of 22:38.1. Clarence Cannon Conference foe Macon was the second-place team with 47 points.

In the field of 74 runners, Lesher was only beaten by conference foe South Shelby’s Noah Wilt and his winning time of 16:47.3. The Centralia boys had five other medalists to win the team competition by a wide margin — 61 points less than runner-up Macon — including Landon Moss in fourth place with a time of 17:41.6, John Holiman in fifth with a time of 17:50.9, Carter Moss in sixth with a time of 17:53.8. Elijah Hill in 11th with a time of 18:14.5 and Dryst Bostick in 13th with a time of 18:19.1.