Pat Harty

Your Prep Sports

IOWA CITY – Sarah Lehman is too accomplished as a high school softball pitcher to be overwhelmed or intimidated by any circumstance on the field.

Regina’s star senior used that experience to survive a difficult seventh inning as the Regals hung on to defeat Wilton 5-4 in a Class 2A Region 4 semifinal at Regina.

Eighth-ranked Regina was leading 5-0 when Wilton scored four runs in the top of the seventh inning. The rally, and the game, finally ended when Amanda Fowler popped out to second baseman Lauren Marth for the third out.

“I just have confidence in myself and confidence in my team because we’ve been here before,” Lehman said.

Regina improved to 26-11 and will face Dyersville Beckman in a regional final on Monday in Dyersville, while Wilton finished 20-18, with three of its losses coming against Regina.

The Regals are trying to earn yet another trip to the state tournament where they won the Class 2A state title in 2015 and finished runner-up last season.

Lehman was a key performer for both of those teams and her experience paid dividends on Friday.

“It does help,” Regina coach Jon Prottsman said of Lehman’s experience. “She has confidence in herself. And more than that, her teammates have confidence in her.

“I think Sarah sometimes thinks a little bit too much. I think she did tonight a couple times. But her being a senior and the kids supporting her and knowing her and what she can do I think helps a lot.”

Lehman helped her cause on the mound by smacking a two-run home run to left field in the first inning. Emma Corkery also scored on Lehman’s blast after having reached base with a single.

The Regals expanded the lead to 5-0 by scoring three runs in the fourth inning. Sophomore catcher Maeve Dunne sparked the rally with a two-run double. She also had s single in her first plate appearance and performed well behind the plate.

“She did a great job behind the plate,” Prottsman said of Dunne. “She caught some pitches that could have been wild pitches very easily.

“She just had a fantastic game tonight. It was probably the best game she’s had for a while.”

Dunne said her success at the plate was the result of hard work and preparation.

“I’ve had a lot of practice hitting,” she said.

Prottsman, in his 18th season at Regina, has been coaching long enough to know that a five-run lead isn’t safe, even in the seventh inning and with your star pitcher on the mound.

“One of fans said to me, this is about done, and I said, `no, no, don’t ever says this is about done because once you say that and open your mouth, things start happening and it did,” Prottsman said. “(Sarah) got a little careless and I think she got a little relaxed and she walked a couple and a couple pitches she let go she shouldn’t have and they hit it.”

 Prottsman really started to worry after Wilton had sliced the lead to just one run.

“Oh, yeah, anybody who says you don’t worry about that are lying their head off,” Prottsman said. “I just felt kind of lucky that one more little base hit didn’t drop in somewhere.”

Wilton had chances to score in the first two innings, but left four runners on base instead. Lehman had back-to-back strikeouts in both innings to help quell the potential rallies.

She seemed to pitch with a sense of urgency whenever Wilton had runners on base.

When asked why, Lehman said:

“I don’t know. I guess I thought we’re almost done.”

Lehman scattered five hits and finished with eight strikeouts while improving her record to 12-6 on the season. She didn’t allow a hit from the third through the sixth inning.

Wilton  000  000  4  –  4  5  0

Regina  200  300  x  –  5 10 1

Falloyn Grunder and Alexis Maurer; Sarah Lehman and Maeve Dunne.

W – Sarah Lehman                 L – Falloyn Grunder

2B – WIL: Falloyn Grunder, Kortney Drake; ICR: Maeve Dunne

HR – ICR: Sarah Lehman