The Barren County softball team got the upper hand in a tightly packed race for the top seed in District 15 with a 5-2 win at Warren East on Thursday.

Barren County (15-4 overall, 4-1 District 15) got some timely hitting and a solid outing from pitcher Shea Bogue to earn the season sweep over Warren East. The Trojanettes can clinch a share of the top seed in the district tournament with a win at Allen County-Scottsville on Saturday.

“It was a very big win,” Barren County coach Jonathan Myatt said. “I told the girls coming into this game that this is the most important game we’ve played all year, especially when it comes to district. We’ve got Allen on Saturday and they still have to play East twice. Coming in and taking this game from East and having two wins against them just puts us in a little better shape. We definitely have to take care of business on Saturday against Allen and hope it plays out here that maybe we will come out as the one seed.”

Barren County started the scoring with a two-out RBI single from Josey Moore. One inning later Katie Elmore doubled, moved to third on a sacrifice and came around on a ground ball to short to make the score 2-0.

“We’ve struggled in the past with getting those timely hits,” Myatt said. “We got them tonight when we needed them. We moved baserunners over. Sacrifice bunts. We hadn’t done that a lot this year, but we knew this was going to be a tough game and we knew they were going to be ready. We wanted to do what we could to the W.”

Warren East (18-5, 1-2) got on the board in the bottom of the fourth on an RBI single by Kennedy Lawson, but the Trojanttes answered with a two-run single from Briley Aidala in the top of the fifth that made the score 4-1.

Jordan Brooks doubled home a run in the bottom of the inning, but the Lady Raiders missed a chance to trim the deficit closer. Brooks was thrown out trying to stretch the double into a triple and after two more runners reached, Bogue was able to get a fielder’s choice to end the rally.

Barren County got that run back in the top of the sixth on a two-out RBI triple by Elmore.

That would be all the Trojanettes would need, with Warren East stranding a runner at third in the sixth and going down in order in the final at-bat.

“Getting that win gave us a little more of that cushion,” Elmore said. “This district is really tough, so having this game under our belt really just pushed our confidence.”

Barren County finished with nine hits, three from Elmore and two from Moore.

Bogue earned the win, allowing six hits and three walks in seven innings.

“Shea did an excellent job tonight,” Myatt said. “She’s been consistent all year. She’s a great kid, especially since she is a sophomore, to be doing what she is doing right now. We live a lot with her. We put a lot of faith in her and she does the job.”

Autumn Brooks finished with two hits for the Lady Raiders. Warren East were 2-for-10 with runners in scoring position, stranding eight runners.

“Millimeters of an inch between hitting a line drive and a fly ball,” Warren East coach Jennifer Brooks said. “There is a big difference between the two when you’ve got runners on base. We couldn’t come up with what we needed in a certain situation, but overall I was happy with the contact we were making and putting the ball in play. It continued the whole game.”

Barren County plays at Allen County-Scottsville at 3 p.m. on Saturday. ACS won the first meeting on April 17 and could still claim the top seed if it wins out. The Lady Patriots, who lost to Warren East 12-3 in the 2A championships in March, play Warren East twice next week – beginning with a visit to East on Monday at 5:30 p.m.

“We have to come out Monday strong against Allen County,” Brooks said. “Bring it to them like we did at 2A and see where it goes from there.”

BCHS 011 021 0 – 5 9 0

WEHS 000 110 0 – 2 6 1

WP: Bogue LP: Lindsey