Jasper — MAYO-With the game on the line in the bottom of the seventh, Hamilton County catcher Blake Daniels desperately needed a clutch hit.

Daniels, who came to the plate 0-for-2, lined a  RBI triple past second baseman Emily Howell. While the ball slipped past Howell, it somehow skipped past left fielder Makayla Norton and rolled to the left field fence allowing Emily Carter (who was hit by a pitch) to easily score from first, giving Hamilton County a 6-5 win April 19 over Jefferson County in the opening round of the District 4-2A tournament at Lafayette.

The clutch hit was extra special for Daniels, who hit a 2-run homerun last year against Branford to win that game.

"I saw the pitch down the middle and coach told us to jump on it all night and I just tried to get the run in," Daniels said. "I was thinking come on Emily book it home and I was able to reach third."

After two blowout wins over Jefferson earlier in the season (20-4, 13-1), Snipes knew this one would be a lot closer.

"We knew it would be a ball game, as they (Jefferson County) had nothing to lose, being the bottom seed everybody expected them to lose, " Hamilton County head coach Keith Snipes said. 

Early on it looked like Hamilton wouldn't need late game heroics, jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the first.

Leadoff hitter Megan Snipes singled past Howell and Paige Fenneman, reached safely on a bunt single past Jefferson County pitcher Ashley Perkins, to put the Trojans at first and second with no outs.

Carter followed with a 2 RBI single to right field scoring both Snipes and Fenneman, giving the Trojans a 2-0 lead. Daniels reached on an error by Norton, allowing Carter to reach second. Courtney Moody lined into a fielder's choice as Norton tagged Daniels out and then overthrew first, allowing Carter to score from second. 

Jefferson answered in the top of the second as Megan McLelland led off the inning with a single to right center and scored on a grounder to second two batters later cutting the lead to 3-1.

Starter Megan Snipes was helped out by a stellar defense led by left fielder Rebecca Hunter. Hunter made three spectacular plays robbing the Tigers of three potentinal doubles in the third and fourth innings.

"Becca has made some really big plays for us," Snipes said. "She's normally our rightfielder but we had to move her to left probably four games ago, she has stepped it up for us."  

After a leadoff fly out to Hunter, Alyssa Lewis singled to left field. Lewis advanced to third after an illegal pitch and a wild pitch from Snipes. Lewis scored on a Perkins grounder to third cutting the lead to 3-2 in the fourth.

Perkins handcuffed the Trojans offense retiring eight in a row from the second through the fifth inning.

"We took some bad swings to help her (Perkins) out, but you're right we had to get our timing down again, "Snipes said. "She threw hard against us the first time we played. She also looked real good for someone who broke their thumb six weeks ago."

Hamilton appeared to put it away with two more runs in the bottom of the fifth. Snipes singled to right field and Fenneman reached on an error by right fielder Kaylee Babb putting the Trojans at second and third with no outs.

Carter's sac fly scored Snipes from third and Fenneman scored two batters later on Howell's error off Moody, giving Hamilton a 5-2 lead in the fifth.

Jefferson, however, tied it with a three-run sixth, evening the score  for the first time.

McLelland reached on an error by third baseman Cindy Castillo and scored on Lewis' RBI triple to rightfield that got past Jamee Daniels cutting the lead to 5-3.

Perkins helped herself out with a RBI single to left scoring Lewis cutting it to 5-4. Perkins reached second on Hunter's errant throw to Snipes. Carlee Barber followed with a grounder to second scoring Perkins tying the game at 5-5 in the sixth.

With two outs in the sixth, Snipes doubled down the line but was left stranded as Perkins froze Fenneman on a called strike three.

Snipes sent the Tigers down in order to give the Trojans one final chance in the seventh.

"We gave up a little bit because we thought we had it and we had to refocus," Snipes said. "We made some errors on defense, we had to keep them focused, but they realized it's time to win or go home, I'm so proud of all of them." 

Megan Snipes led the offense going 4-for-4, scoring two runs to go along with a  double; while Fenneman was 1-for-2 scoring two runs , Carter was 1-for-2 with 2 RBIs and Daniels was 1-for-3 with a RBI.   

Hamilton County (3-12) earned their third win of the year all against Jefferson County (4-13) to move on to the District 5-1A semi-finals Tuesday, where the Trojans met top seeded North Florida Christian.            

"There is nothing really you can do now but hope this carries over to tommorow," Snipes said. "But we got a new wrinkle to throw at them, hopefully it works in our favor, we definately got our work cut out for us."        

A win over NFC would not only put the Trojans in the championship game Thursday April 22 at 7 p.m.  but also in the Class 2A state playoffs.