The Lady Scots softball team beat West Brunswick in the first round of the 3A NCHSAA state playoffs 10-0 on Tuesday night. Here, the Scots celebrate a grand slam by Addison Johnson (2). Johnson’s four RBIs led the team.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
Avery Stutts (17) throws a pitch. Stutts pitched all five innings and had 11 strikeouts in the win.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
Dawson Blue (4) lays down a bunt for a single. Blue went 2-2 at the plate with an RBI (on a home run) and two runs scored.
Andrew Smolar | The Laurinburg Exchange
LAURINBURG —The Lady Scots softball team advanced to the second round of the 3A NCHSAA state playoffs with a 10-0 victory (five innings) over the West Brunswick Trojans on Tuesday night at Scotland High School. Scotland’s season record improves to 24-1 overall (23 consecutive wins) with the victory while West Brunswick ends their season at 7-13 with their second straight loss.
Head Coach Adam Romaine was pleased with the way his team made corrections throughout the game and were able to put the ball in play with high frequency. Scotland outhit West Brunswick 12-2 in the game while also benefitting from four errors by the Trojans.
“The bats came alive after a couple of innings, we made to make some adjustments, made some bad decisions on some pitch selections the first time through the lineup,” Romaine said. “We started hitting some line drive base hits, line drive doubles, impressed with the hitting and that 1-9 put the ball in play well.”
After Avery Stutts struck out the side in the top of the first inning, the Scots would grab an early lead in their half of the frame. Consecutive singles from Dawson Blue (on a bunt) and Stutts (courtesy runner was Marissa Smith) gave the Scots a pair of base runners with one out. After Blue and Smith stole third and second respectively, Blue would score thanks to a fielding error to make it 1-0 after an inning.
The Trojans had a chance to answer back in the top of the second as the first two batters were hit by pitches and advanced to scoring position on a sacrifice bunt from Katelyn Woodard but promptly saw the next two batters strikeout as they failed to take advantage. Scotland would add another run to their lead in the bottom of the inning, with Kinsey Hamilton getting the train going on a one-out single and advancing to second on a fielding error. Another error on a fly ball hit by Addison Ratley would allow Hamilton to reach third before a sacrifice fly from Addison Lewis doubled Scotland’s lead to 2-0.
Stutts would then send West Brunswick down in order in the top of the third before the Scots blew the game open with an eight run bottom of the inning. 13 batters were sent to the plate as Scotland compiled seven hits, including two home runs (a leadoff solo homer from Blue and a one-out grand slam by Addison Johnson) in the inning to make it 10-0.
The fourth inning would have three combined hits: a leadoff single in the top of the inning by Alivia West and two-out singles from Ratley and Lewis in the home half of the frame but no runs were scored on either side. Savannah Robinson added another single to leadoff the top of the fifth but the Trojans failed to bring the run across they needed in order to extend the game.
Johnson’s grand slam gave her the team lead in RBIs with four. Four Scotland batters had two hits: Blue, Stutts, Ratley and Lewis. Blue, Emily Sampson, Khloe Radford and Lewis had one RBI each.
Stutts pitched all five innings and had 11 strikeouts against no walks. She threw 71 pitches (55 strikes) to the 19 batters she faced.
Scotland as the No. 2 seed will host No. 18 Western Alamance, who beat North Brunswick 13-3 in the first round, on Friday night at 7 p.m. The Scots have not faced the Warriors this season.
After falling in the second round a year ago to Havelock, Romaine is aware of the preparation that will be necessary over the next couple of days for Scotland to be ready for a tough battle. When you factor in that Western Alamance ended the Scots’ season in both 2022 and 2023, the test appears even stiffer.
“Pressure’s going to be on everybody because we have to prove we can get past the second round, we’re going to have to stay focused over these next two days of practice,” Romaine said. “We got Western Alamance coming in here, they’re a good program, they have the advantage on us they’re 2-0 against us in the playoffs in the past four years.”
The winner will meet either No. 7 Cape Fear or No. 23 Southern Alamance in the third round on Tuesday. The full bracket for the tournament can be found on MaxPreps here: 2025 NCHSAA Softball State Championship (3A).