This senior bounced back and helped lead Houston County’s energy resurgence in doubleheader sweep of rival Veterans

WARNER ROBINS — The saying “bounce back” gets used a lot, but Thursday night was that and more for Houston County.

In the grand scheme of things, the Lady Bears (17-9, 13-5 Region 2-6A) are no closer to a region championship after Thursday’s sweep of Veterans (15-10, 11-5 Region) by scores of 2-0 and 4-1, but they were night and day from Tuesday’s loss.

The most notable change was their energy in the dugout. On Tuesday, head coach April Collins said multiple times, ‘I need more energy from you guys.’

The chants weren’t as passionate or as frequent as usual and it showed as HoCo struggled to score. Fast forward a couple of days, and several girls were singing “Animals” by Maroon 5 in the middle of Game 3, which they led 4-0 at the time.

“Tuesday we were playing really stale, and that’s why I was like, ‘We need energy,’” Collins said. “We play better when we’re loose and having fun. So I challenged them yesterday at practice … let’s have fun with it and play ball … If we have a lot of energy, that’s when we play well.”

There was a personal bounce back, too.

Just from watching senior Olivia Buffone, you can tell she is hard on herself when she makes mistakes. Whether it’s a fumbled grounder, a strikeout or fly out she can appear frustrated with her performance.

She was 0-for-4 at the plate in Game 1. On Thursday she was 3-for-6 and hit a home run, which got a few roars out of her during her trot around the bases.

Learning to show herself some grace has been a big part of her journey this year.

“She’s hard on herself because she knows she has really, really good potential. She knows what type of ball player she is,” Collins said. “Something we worked on this year is coming in [and] giving yourself some grace. Write in a journal, what are your thoughts, what to do for the next at-bat. … It was kind of like a moment for her to have to reset.”

Collins said that Buffone doesn’t do it as much anymore, but she did learn a lot from the experience.

“She’s done a good job of being able to come in, reset and then [go back to] cheering,” Collins said. “That energy that she has, whenever she’s there with her positivity, it’s what helps lead the team. So if she can play like that, playing loose and giving herself some grace, she leads the team in the right direction.”

The pitching staff had a better night as well.

Allie Hutto gave up three hit-by-pitches and two walks in Game 1, but in Game 3 the only run she allowed was from Kalleigh Stokes’ solo home run. She also only allowed one walk.

Piper Lambert pitched a total of 12 innings, gave up six hits, one walk and struck out four batters to go with no earned runs.

The defense as a whole very nearly shut the Lady Warhawks out in both games before Stokes’ seventh-inning bomb.

“They did great. Piper was able to get them to hit a lot of pop ups tonight … and Allie was able to come in and close it out. Honestly, they work together, [they’re a] really good duo,” Collins said.