Lady Tigers Edge Fayetteville 5-4

FAYETTEVILLE — Prairie Grove upstaged Class 6A Fayetteville, 5-4, to stay alive in the Farmington Invitational Softball Tournament Saturday afternoon at Lady Dawg Park in Fayetteville.

Charity Stearman’s clutch single over first base drove in the winning run and Prairie Grove held off Fayetteville in the fifth inning of a time limited game with starter Chloe Hillian recording a strike out with a runner at first.

The Lady Tigers (7-3, 1-0 4A-1) rebounded nicely from a tournament opening, 17-4, loss to eventual tourney champion Bentonville West by scoring three runs in the first inning. In the bottom of the inning Fayetteville’s second batter walked and scored on an RBI double.

Hillian got Ciera Arnold to ground out to shortstop and Allie Bowerman to send a fly ball into center field where it was caught to limit the damage and get out of the inning.

Hillian reached on an error in the third and raced to second with the Lady Bulldogs slow in retrieving the ball. Stearman drove in Prairie Grove’s fourth run of the game with a single.

Fayetteville fought back scoring a pair of runs in the third on Karlee Stonecipher’s 2-run single into right field cutting the Lady Tiger lead in half at 4-2.

Aided by an error and a walk the Lady Bulldogs tied the game in the fourth inning before Hillian induced an infield fly to shortstop to halt the rally setting the stage for Stearman’s game winning RBI single in the fifth.

Prairie Grove scored 5 runs on 7 hits and committed one error while Fayetteville had 4 runs on 5 hits with an error.

MARK HUMPHREY ENTERPRISE-LEADER Prairie Grove senior Charity Stearman drove in the winning run during the Lady Tigers’ 5-4 win over Fayetteville Saturday in the Farmington Invitational Softball Tournament. This game was played at Lady Dawg Park at Fayetteville.