Something to cheer for

After a winless 2011 season, Murray County High’s softball team only could go up this year.

The question now is how high.

The Lady Indians have been a surprising success among area softball teams through the first half of the season, tallying a .500 record overall at 9-9 and in Region 7-2A play (1-1) after last year’s frustration.

The signs started appearing early for coach Sandra Johnston, who suffered through last year, when pitchers were at a premium and she was handcuffed on how to use the talent she had.

“I realized at camp this summer that we were going to be better than we were,” said Johnston, who is in her fifth season as coach. “I’ve got kids that want to play, and that makes all the difference in the world. Last year I had five that had never played or hadn’t played for two or three years.”

Center fielder Madison Wilcox, one of two seniors along with Aleshia Townsend, also witnessed the disappointment of 2011. A big difference this season is attitude, she said. Wilcox said the Lady Indians will not let one bad play equal more of the same, which she sees as a stark contrast to last year.

“The attitudes are a lot better,” she said. “Last year after we started losing a certain amount of games, everybody was down and didn’t care and just didn’t give it their all. This year we have a new set of girls who play travel ball and just take it more serious.”

The new group of freshmen — Tiffany Christopher, Lindsey Dunn, Whitney Gribble, Ashlea McCurdy and Aubrie Osborne — has been a big factor.

“I’ve got seven kids that played tournament ball, whereas last year I had three,” Johnston said. “That has helped a lot because they put time in.

“How would you say it? You get better when no one is watching. They put in the time to make themselves better.”

Said junior Caitlyn Sims, “Our upcoming freshmen were experienced and knew what they were doing and filled in. Hitting is a lot better.”

Johnston believes things really began to “turn around” when Murray County beat Adairsville 5-4 on Aug. 11. Nine days later the Lady Indians rallied from an early 3-0 deficit to beat Coahulla Creek 4-3 in extra innings.

“They don’t quit,” Johnston said. “They don’t give up. They will play to the end. They’ll play until the game is over.”

While there were good signs early in the schedule, it has taken the Lady Indians a little while to reach .500. A loss followed each early win, and the Lady Indians were 5-7 heading into this past Thursday’s home game against Chattooga, which was 12-2 and 4-0 in region play entering the matchup. Chattooga was also ranked third in the Ga.PrepCoun-try.com Class 2A coaches poll at the time.

Before the game, Johnston said of her team, which has 10 underclassmen on the 13-player roster, “They’re just young. I wish we could put two wins together. We haven’t done that yet.”

Murray County beat Chat-tooga 3-2 on a walkoff single by Dunn, the team’s second baseman, in the seventh inning. But Murray County had a 2-0 lead with one out in the top half of the inning and allowed Chattooga to tie and force the host team to return to the plate.

“Last year everybody’s heads would’ve been down,” Wilcox said.

But this season is new. The win was the start of a 4-1 stretch that moved the Lady Indians to 9-8 before they lost their final game Saturday at Adairsville’s Tiger Town Classic. Murray County was sixth out of 12 teams at the tournament, the strongest indication yet they can stick around beyond the halfway point.

“We have to get in our heads that we’re good,” Johnston said. “They’re getting it.”

Murray County is not the only local softball team raising eyebrows, though.

Southeast Whitfield, which is 7-10 and 2-2 in Sub-region 7B-4A, has already surpassed its 2011 win total of three. According to records posted at Ga.PrepCountry.com, the Lady Raiders haven’t had a winning season since 2008; they haven’t made the state playoffs since 2005.

“I do believe we have improved a lot this year,” said Kelley Barton, a 2005 Southeast graduate who’s in her first year as the team’s head coach. “We had a very talented freshman class that came in. I think we started to develop that foundation last year and that helped carry over to this year.”

Southeast’s roster makeup is similar to Murray County’s — one senior, two juniors and 11 underclassmen.

Senior Tavi Parris saw the face of the team change with the entrance of six freshmen: Sydney Covington, Emily Beck, Beverly Warfield, Anissa Sosebee, Isabel Salinas and Lilly Johnson.

“We had a bunch of young, talented freshman come in that helped us a lot,” Parris said, noting she started seeing improvement at the team’s first official practice.

“Because we were all-around more talented than last year doing the drills and stuff,” Parris said.

It is a young team that is going through some growing pains, Barton said, including losing games it shouldn’t.

“We actually should have won both games that we lost in the first tournament we played in,” she said. “In one game we were winning 4-0 and in the other we were winning 3-0 and lost both. So I guess our record is a little misleading as far as improvement.”

However, there were moments when the promise seemed to shine bright, like a 6-4 victory at Dalton.

“Our record hasn’t shown, but I think the game against Dalton when we came back from a 4-0 deficit really increased our confidence,” Barton said. “We’ve been working since February for this season. Every practice I had every kid who was not in a summer team at workouts. I think that was a big improvement (toward becoming) a winning program.”

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Something to cheer for

Improvement shows for Murray County, Southeast Whitfield softball

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