5A high school softball: Viewmont gets a shot at Bingham for title

TAYLORSVILLE — A few more heart-stopping moments greeted the Viewmont Vikings when they took on the Spanish Fork softball team in the final game of the one-loss bracket of the 5A state tournament.

And with the game dead even with the two schools heading into the bottom of the seventh, the Viewmont Vikings were actually looking pretty good as the top of the lineup was stepping into the batters' box. Singles to Cina Cummings and Katie Bowdidge and an intentional walk to pitcher Shelbi Tyteca loaded the bases with two outs for Kalli Randall.

Randall delivered as she usually does with a single down the third-base line that scored Cummings and put the Vikings into the championship game against Bingham later today with the 4-3 victory.

"Kalli did what we needed her to do. She has the highest batting average on the team, and she's the player we want up there," said Viewmont coach Tiffany Randall about her younger sister.

The Vikings got things going early, taking a two-run lead. They held onto it until the Dons came out with their bats swinging in the top of the fifth. Tina Ferguson walked and Katelyn Elliott smacked her third home run in the last two days deep over the center field fence, deadlocking things at 2-2.

After Kyle Bufton doubled to deep right, a pair of errors allowed a third run to cross the plate for the Dons, giving them a 3-2 lead.

"We've been making errors we don't normally make," said Randall, noting that they'll have to cut down on the mistakes in the championship game.

She also wants to keep the bats hitting as they did in the sixth and seventh innings.

The Vikings made up for the errors with a pair of singles by Megan Peay and Tyteca and a double to Tyteca's younger sister Bailey, who sent in the game-tying run with her shot to deep left center.

The Dons finished in third place in the state tournament, and the Vikings went on to play Bingham for the title. If the Miners win game one, they take the championship, but if the Vikings win the game, the two teams will play a second time for the title.

e-mail: jolsen@desnews.com