The Pike County Lady Bulldogs finished day one of the Class 3A Area 4 tournament with a 1-1 record after defeating Abbeville 13-3 and then falling to top-seeded Dale County 17-2.

“I was proud with them for how they played the first game,” said Bulldogs head coach Fawn Sims. “Brooke (Bennett) pitched a great game. We hit the ball and we were effective on the bases. We made some mistakes on defense, but other than that we played pretty solid.”

The Bulldogs broke through in the fourth inning when they were able to beat the ball into the ground and forced the Yellow Jackets at making mistakes in the field.

“We started playing small ball,” Sims said. “We started bunting the ball, which created a lot of mistakes. Brooke came up a couple times and hit two shots that drove runs in. We made them move and it forced them to make mistakes. That’s when it turned around for us.”

Bennett pitched all five innings in the shortened game for the Bulldogs in game one and for the most part she kept the Yellow Jackets hitters at bay.

“She did a good job at hitting her spots,” Sims said. “The first inning she was getting in the groove of the things. They hit a couple of balls to the outfield and scored a couple runs. She was able to get the ground balls and the pop flies and that is her job to do.”

Offensively, Jordan Carlisle contributed with two hits. Nicole Holland also had two hits for the Bulldogs.

Game two against top-seeded Dale County did not go the Bulldogs’ way.

“We looked to put the ball in play in game two,” Sims said. “We only struck out two times. Offensively, it’s hard to look past the fact that we did put the ball in play. We forced a couple of mistakes. We got runners on, but couldn’t produce the runs.”

Senkethia Thompson got the start for the Bulldogs and after a couple times through the lineup Dale County caught up to her.

“She didn’t do a bad job,” Sims said. “We saw their lineup a couple of times and they started to get their bats around on Kiki’s pitches.”

The lone offense of game two came from Bennett, who hit a two-run homerun to centerfield to cut the Bulldogs deficit to 11-2.

The Bulldogs will now play in an elimination game against Abbeville on Friday afternoon at 4 p.m.

“We have to step in there and look to beat Abbeville like we did today,” Sims said. “If we can’t than our season will be cut shorter than I think it should be.”