Lancers are champs! Legion softball sweeps AJ to take state title in first full season
Legion Collegiate’s Reagan Smith had the hot hand. And she settled into the batter’s box in the 2A state softball championship game’s fifth inning on Thursday night in Rock Hill like she knew it.
Her team needed a spark.
At the time, Legion was still clinging to a 5-4 lead over Andrew Jackson in Game 2 of the championship series — but the tides had appeared to turn in AJ’s favor after the last half-inning: Senior Volunteer Caroline Wrenn had hit a grand slam, nearly washing away Legion’s 5-0 lead in one swing. And now it was time for Smith, another senior, to answer the call.
Smith waded into her stance in the batter’s box, waited on a fastball and swung on. The ball cut through the cloudy sky and flew over the right field fence.
And there it was: A two-run home run. Her second of the day — and only her third of the season, after an injury had kept her sidelined all year until the playoffs.
And that hit all but cemented some special Legion history: Two innings later, after a infield pop up caught on the fly, Legion players stormed the field and threw their gloves into the air in excitement.
Legion had won, 10-4.
The Lancers — in short order and yet at long last, in their first full spring sports season ever since the school opened in 2019 — were state champions.
“I love this team to death,” Smith told The Herald postgame with a big smile and a medallion around her neck. “They’re my best friends, and I knew they had my back the whole time, so I was excited to share this moment with them.”
Legion started really well on Thursday, perhaps still riding high after its Game 1 win on Tuesday night: The scoring began in the first inning, after Legion’s Morgan Langley hit a sacrifice fly that sent Aleah Roy home. The Lancers would then score four more runs unanswered, which included a solo home run from Smith in the bottom of the second.
5-0, Legion was up.
The Volunteers fought back: In the top of the fifth, Andrew Jackson’s Wrenn hit the aforementioned grand slam, tightening the game’s score to 5-4.
But it ultimately wasn’t enough. Later came Smith’s second home run of the day (part of the Newberry commit’s 4-for-4 effort at the plate); a Joel Owens sacrifice fly RBI to send Roy home once more; and a Gabi Wilson two-run bomb that put the game at 10-4.
And the score didn’t budge after that.
“It didn’t hit me until like maybe two seconds ago,” said Legion junior pitcher Taylor Watson with a big smile postgame. She was still holding the state championship sign she’d held while smiling for a sea of parents and grandparents and Legion coaches begging for the attention of the newest state champions with their cell phone cameras. “It didn’t feel real at all at first, but now it does.”
Watson pitched all seven innings for Legion and threw five strikeouts and only allowed five hits.
Andrew Jackson was led by Skylar Huffman, who pitched all seven innings for the Volunteers and added a hit on offense; Wrenn, who notched two hits and four RBI; Madi Adams, who went 1-for-3 at the plate; and Savannah Parker, who went 1-for-3 at the plate and scored a run.
This state title is the first one the Rock Hill public charter school has won in any sport.
Andrew Jackson, a public school based in Kershaw in Lancaster County, was going for its first softball state championship since 2007.
How region foes Legion, Andrew Jackson met in 2A state title game
It’s true that Legion Collegiate Academy was built with athletic excellence in mind. But that doesn’t make its 2020-21 softball state championship run any less remarkable.
The Lancers, after their inaugural season was cut short due to COVID, took on an ambitious slate to begin what would be the program’s first full softball season. They took their fair share of lumps in the process, too — at one point losing five of seven against some of the state’s best teams, including 5A powers like Byrnes, Fort Mill and Chapin.
It wouldn’t take long for Legion to catch fire, though.
The Rock Hill-based public charter school didn’t lose in Region 4-2A play on its way to a region title. That run, of course, included nine wins by 10 runs or more, as well as two region wins over its eventual state champion opponent, Andrew Jackson. (The Lancers defeated the Volunteers 16-6 and then 8-3 in the regular season.)
And once the playoffs arrived? The Lancers rose to that challenge, too — winning four straight elimination games in the first round and two in the Upper State series before sweeping Andrew Jackson for the 2A state championship.
“This is just a big deal,” Legion coach Mark Cooke told The Herald in an interview Thursday. “We focused on this from the first practice last year, the COVID year. And they have never wavered from what they’re willing to do.”
Andrew Jackson traversed a completely different path than its Region 4-2A brethren did to get to Thursday.
The Volunteers, after finishing third in Region 4-2A and sneaking into the playoffs as a No. 2 seed in the 2A Lower State bracket, started playing their best softball at the right time: They hummed through the first round of the playoffs with four straight wins and then defeated Buford for the Lower State title in a best-of-three series — showing admirable toughness by winning two straight after losing Game One of said series 11-1.
“Nobody thought we’d be here — I mean nobody,” Andrew Jackson fifth-year head coach Wesley Kidd told The Herald on Tuesday night, after Game One of the series. He said the team had really high expectations coming into the year, but two key injuries adjusted the team’s preseason outlook. (Caroline Wrenn and Olivia Gandy were out all season and returned to the lineup in the Lower State final series against Buford, Kidd said.)
But the team’s youth — and resilience — only made the run sweeter, Kidd said postgame Thursday.
“My goal every year, like everybody, is to win it all,” he said. “But ultimately, when I see a team that comes in and then doesn’t get any better (throughout the season), I think it’s probably time for me to go. But this team really got better and better and better.”
Quotes from a historic night
Gabi Wilson on when the win will feel real: “It doesn’t feel real yet. No it doesn’t,” she said with a big smile. “Maybe it will when we get our rings.”
Taylor Watson on what it was like having to regroup after watching that grand slam turn Thursday’s game into a one-run affair: “All I knew was I had to keep going. I had to push through it and not let it get to me,” said the junior, who has thrown every pitch in every game for Legion this season. She then added: “It’s such a weight on your back doing it. Like you said, you can’t fold. You can’t show emotion. You can’t let it get to your head or anything. So I had to keep pushing through.”
Reagan Smith on being a senior and laying the foundation for Legion softball: “It was just a moment of excitement because this was the first and last chance I’ve ever had to play in the high school state championship game. I’m just excited. ... It means a lot to me because we started a school tradition, I guess. We couldn’t play last year because of COVID.
“We started out the playoffs rough. We lost our first game. But then we came back and fought as hard as we could.”
Editor’s note: A previous version of this article stated that the game lasted six innings. It lasted seven.
This story was originally published June 3, 2021 at 11:14 PM.
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