Harrison County powers its way to rain-delayed state softball quarterfinals
Harrison County’s Owyn McCoy picked a good time to break out of her home run slump — and did she ever.
McCoy smashed a two-run home run in the first inning and a three-run shot in the third to help power No. 10 Harrison County to a 13-0 win in six innings over Covington Holy Cross in Friday’s first round of the Clark’s Pump-N-Shop Softball State Tournament presented by UK HealthCare at the University of Kentucky’s John Cropp Stadium.
“It looked like a beach ball coming in. It was an inside pitch low, and it just looked perfect,” McCoy said of her first home run swings in 46 games. She hit three home runs in each of the last two years and had one as a varsity eighth grader. “I was like, ‘I’m gonna swing as hard as I can to see what happens.’ And it just flew.”
Harrison County’s 10 a.m. start beat the Friday afternoon storms and was one of just two of the four first-round games completed on the second day of the tournament. Both of Friday evening’s games were postponed until Saturday.
That shuffling pushed Scott County’s quarterfinal game against Rowan County to 5:30 p.m. Saturday. The state baseball tournament suffered the same fate. Half of the softball and baseball quarterfinals are now scheduled for Sunday. The semifinals and finals of each tournament remain set for next weekend.
Despite McCoy’s power outage this season, the Fillies’ cleanup hitter entered Friday with a .422 average, 22 RBI and 27 runs scored. She padded those numbers with her dingers and a two-run single in the sixth inning that gave her seven RBIs and four runs scored on the day and put Harrison County up by a mercy-rule margin.
“We’ve laughed all year about how she just kept hitting the top of the fence several times,” Harrison County coach Chad Persinger said. “One time, it hit the tip top of the fence and came back. … We’re not surprised. That was good for her and I hope her confidence is beaming tomorrow.”
McCoy went 3-for-3 and got intentionally walked in the fifth inning drawing cheers from the crowd after she jokingly flexed her biceps on the way to first base.
I had the mindset of, ‘I just need to go out here and make contact with the ball, and the rest will follow.’ And two home runs on the whole season are in my hands,” McCoy said, smiling for the media with two game balls during her postgame interview.
In all, six Fillies factored into the scoring. Shyanne Ross had a pair of hits and two runs scored in addition to pitching five innings of two-hit ball before giving way to Isabella Persinger in the sixth. Ross struck out eight. Persinger sat Holy Cross (18-13) down in order to close the game and scored twice on a hit and a walk. Lexie Highlander added two hits, two RBI and a run scored.
Next, Harrison County (34-6) will face No. 3 Assumption at 1 p.m. Sunday.
The Fillies are looking to make their deepest run in program history having only gone as far as the quarterfinals three times in their four appearances at the state tournament. A number of players from this year’s team were part of Harrison County’s run to the elite eight in 2022 where they lost 8-7 to Lexington Catholic.
“We’ve been to this spot right here a time or two, but we’ve never won the next game to get to the final four,” Coach Persinger said. “I feel like we’ve got the team to do it, but it’s going to be whoever comes out tomorrow and plays well.”
Seeing No. 1 South Warren fall to No. 6 Daviess County on Thursday served as a reminder to the Fillies and the rest of the field that single-elimination tournament play means every moment counts.
“It was big. They were No. 1 all year. They weren’t just No. 1, lately,” Coach Persinger said of South Warren’s defeat, noting it signaled the state tournament is anyone’s ball game. “You’ve got to be excited. But it ain’t going to matter a bit if we don’t win (Sunday).”
Assumption ousts Oldham County
Through two rain delays that stretched their seven-inning game to nearly five hours, No. 3 Assumption (32-6) defeated No. 11 Oldham County (31-7) by a score of 4-2, fueled by a pair of Jaelynn Oaks doubles that scored one run in the first inning and two more in the third.
Grace Sander added an RBI single in the fourth inning as Assumption pitcher Lauren Satterly pitched the distance for the win, allowing two runs on five hits and seven walks.
Oldham County cut into the Rockets’ lead with two runs in the fifth inning that began with a single by Maddie Brown and an RBI double by Natalie Cheatham. A pair of walks loaded the bases and set up Cheatham’s score on wild pitch moments later to trim Assumption’s lead to 4-2 with no one out.
But after a foul out and the second rain delay of the game, Assumption got a grounder to shortstop Lauren Campisano for a force-out at home and a groundout to Satterly to end the threat.
Friday’s first-round baseball games
South Warren 6, Highlands 5 (9 innings): Gray Pearson’s sacrifice fly to score Jaxon Decker in the bottom of the ninth inning gave the Spartans (31-8) a storm-delayed, walk-off win over the Bluebirds (27-8-1), who had rallied to tie the game in the seventh after losing a 4-1 lead.
Decker led off the ninth with a double down the left-field line and advanced to third on Casey Green’s hit up the middle. After Green’s steal of second base and a popout, Pearson’s fly ball to the gap in left center proved deep enough to bring home the winning run.
Trailing 4-1 through 3½ innings, South Warren scratched out a 5-4 lead going into the seventh. This despite Highlands chasing Spartans starter Austin Allen off the mound with three runs before tallying their first out of the game.
Adam Forton’s two-run triple for the Bluebirds in the first cashed in a leadoff hit by Nolan Schwalbach and a walk to Brooks Hendrix. Forton scored on Kai Anderson’s groundout to put Highlands up 3-0 after Ethan Reynolds came on for South Warren in relief. Back-to-back doubles by Schwalbach and Hendrix tagged on another Highlands run in the second inning.
An RBI single by Ty Croghan in the first and a hit batsman with the bases loaded paired with a run-scoring single by Justin Capps in the fourth cut South Warren’s deficit to 4-3. Back-to-back South Warren doubles by Casey Green and Joseph Fentress tied the game at 4-4 in the fifth.
In the sixth, Griffin Rardin tripled behind a walk to Capps to put South Warren in front. But Highlands answered in the top of the seventh when Hendrix took a 3-1 pitch over the left-field fence to send the game to extra innings.
McCracken County 3, Lyon County 1: The Mustangs (29-8) scored all three of their runs in the second inning as singles by Lane Grace and Braden Truitt set up a one-out, two-run double by Joshua Penrod and an RBI single by Braden Casebrier.
Penrod got the win for 5 ⅓ innings of work, allowing one run on three hits and four walks while striking out five. Noah Godwin held Lyon hitless for the rest of the game.
Lyon opened the scoring in the first inning thanks to a two-out walk to Austin Spears that was followed by Peyton Williams’ triple to left center.
Softball State Tournament
Where: At UK’s John Cropp Stadium
Tickets: GoFan.co/app/school/KHSAA
Streaming: KHSAA.tv
Saturday’s first-round games
10 a.m.: Taylor County (27-7) vs. Letcher County Central (23-14)
1:30 p.m.: Marshall County (28-8-1) vs. Lawrence County (24-7)
Saturday’s quarterfinals
5:30 p.m.: Rowan County (29-5) vs. Scott County (26-6)
8:30 p.m.: Henderson County (31-6) vs. Daviess County (27-3)
Sunday’s quarterfinals
1 p.m.: Harrison County (34-6) vs. Assumption (32-6)
4 p.m.: Taylor County-Letcher County Central winner vs. Marshall County-Lawrence County winner
Friday, June 13
Times TBD: Semifinals.
Saturday, June 14
Time TBD: Championship game.
State Baseball Tournament
Where: At UK’s Kentucky Proud Park
Tickets: GoFan.co/app/school/KHSAA
Streaming: KHSAA.tv
Saturday’s first-round games
10 a.m.: Pleasure Ridge Park (26-6) vs. Corbin (20-17)
1:30 p.m.: Johnson Central (29-7) vs. Spencer County (27-8)
Saturday’s quarterfinals
5 p.m.: Trinity (35-3) vs. Taylor County (29-6)
8:30 p.m.: Boyd County (30-5) vs. Wolfe County (24-11)
Sunday’s quarterfinals
1 p.m.: McCracken County (30-8) vs. South Warren (31-8)
4:30 p.m.: Johnson Central-Spencer County winner vs. Pleasure Ridge Park-Corbin winner
June 13’s semifinals
Times TBD: Final Four
June 14’s finals
Time TBD: Championship game
This story was originally published June 7, 2025 at 8:29 AM.
