FIELD TWP- The North Woods Grizzlies kept their fans on the edge of their sectional playoff seats on Monday, breaking a tie in their final at-bat to defeat Littlefork-Big Falls 6-5 and advance to the second round of play on Thursday in Grand Rapids.
The game got off to a rough start for the Grizzlies when the Vikings’ second batter, Kadence Schmidtbauer, tagged North Woods starter Addison Burckhardt for a two-run homer. The Grizzlies managed to get out of the frame without any more damage.
As they’ve done often this season, the Grizzlies came back in the bottom of the first, with Burckhardt reaching when she was hit by a pitch and scoring on a River Cheney triple. Evalyn Thiel walked and stole second and a single by Ella Kruse brought the runners home for a 3-2 lead.
But while the Grizzlies threatened repeatedly over the next four innings, they couldn’t push a run across the plate as the Vikings scored two in the second and one in the fifth for a 5-3 advantage head into the bottom of the sixth inning.
With the season being over with a loss, the Grizzlies got in gear with Addison Burckhardt smashing a too-hot-to-handle shot to third to reach on an error, and then stole second. Cheney nailed another hard hit that the Vikings’ third baseman couldn’t handle, giving North Woods runners at first and second. Both runners moved up a base on a passed ball, and Evalyn Thiel walked to load the bases.
Kruse stepped up to the plate and rapped a single to center field, with Burckhardt crossing the plate for one run and Cheney diving head first into home for the tying run.
Now pumped up, North Woods shut down the Vikings in the top of the seventh. Shortstop Emarie Gibson erased the first batter with a sharp throw to first, a line drive by the second hitter straight back to the mound was snagged by Burckhardt for the second out, and after a fielding error allowed a runner to reach Burckhardt fielded a grounder and flipped the ball to Cheney at first to retire the side.
The Grizzlies first batter up, Nevada Gauthier, sent the signal to the Vikings that their season was about to be over by hammering a uncatchable liner to center that made it all the way to the fence, with Gauthier’s hustle turning it into a triple. Zoey Burckhardt reached on an infield grounder, then moved into scoring position with a steal. After Addison Burckhardt was out on an infield fly, North Woods cleanup hitter Cheney stepped to the plate. A big clutch double scored Gauthier from third, cashing the Grizzlies’ ticket to the second round.
Head Coach Dee Ann Sandberg was glad to see the Grizzlies catch fire late.
“We were slow the whole game, so we needed to pick it up and get on it,” she said. “It takes us so long sometimes to get going, but they knew they had to do it. We came out on top, that’s all that matters now.”
The win was a solid comeback from a crushing Friday home loss to International Falls. The Broncos scored at will while the Grizzlies scored just once in the 16-1 run-rule shortened drubbing. The Grizzlies got a sour taste of their own medicine, having doled out an equally dominant 17-2 beatdown on Cook County the day before. That game was played on a field more suited for ducks than softball, as rain that stopped just 15 minutes before gametime turned the field into a swampy quagmire.
Back to tournament play, the Grizzlies were scheduled to play second-seeded Moose Lake/Willow River on Thursday in Grand Rapids. If they win, they would play a second game that day against the winner of the South Ridge-Ely game.