WALES — Mop up duty was quickly replaced by panic time Wednesday.

Entering the seventh inning with a seemingly comfortable lead, the Oak Hill softball team had to fight off a late Rockland challenge to eke out a 5-3 victory.

“It was kind of scary,” Oak Hill pitcher Lauren Hall said. “I just tried my best to pitch what I knew to pitch. I had confidence in my catcher and everybody else, but it was very scary.”

Making matters worse for the Raiders was the fact that the scoreboard showed a narrow 5-4 lead. The actual score was 5-3, but the Raiders had no reason to challenge the scoreboard or the scorebook. So with Rockland having a runner on third with just one out, the Raiders were a bit stressed.

“We had two scorebooks going and each one said the same thing,” said Oak Hill coach Julie Boucher, who had put subs in to start the seventh, but had to bring back her starters to fend off the threat.  “There was a batter that was missed or they put something down for that batter that shouldn’t have been there.”

Hall struck out the final two batters and ended the game allowing just five hits. She struck out 10 and walked none.

In the seventh, the Tigers (0-3) took advantage of three Oak Hill errors. Hannah Hersom led off with a single and advanced on an error. Then back-to-back miscues allowed two runs to score. Brittany Young, who had a pair of hits for Rockland, singled. Then a Kaylee Saylo ground out scored Hannah Lacasse and moved Young to third.

That’s when Boucher put starting infielders Alyssa Rouleau, Kortni Michaud and Alexis Priest back onto the field.  With both teams getting subs in and out of the game, nobody noticed the score was wrong.  Thinking the score was 5-4 and Young was the tying run, Hall struck out the final two batters to end the game.

“I was about ready to pull my hair out,” Hall said. “When Coach came out to talk to us and settle us down, I was like, ‘Let’s just do this. Let’s get this done and over with.’ I was a lot more stressed thinking the tying run was on third.”

The teams didn’t know until the game was over that the score was actually 5-3.

“I can always count on Lauren to come through,” Boucher said. “She doesn’t show pressure too much. It was very stressful for her. I re-entered the starting lineup, and she held them nicely. She works very well under pressure. Taylor (Fillion) did a nice job catching and stopping the ball. She was great defensively at the plate, especially with a runner on third.”

Oak Hill built the quick lead with a pair of runs in the first. Rouleau led off with a double and eventually scored on Hall’s sacrifice fly. Fillion later scored on a Michaud single.

In the second, Marrissa Caskin scored on a wild pitch to make it 3-0. The Raiders added two more in the fifth when Becca Tucci tripled in Michaud and then scored on a wild pitch.

“We had some nice hits here and there,” Boucher said. “I was hoping we’d have a longer string of hits offensively.”

Rockland pitcher Catherine MacDonald did a nice job keeping pitches on the corners and the Raider hitters off-balance. Oak Hill managed just four hits, two by Rouleau.

“It was hard for us to get our bats started,” Hall said. “We had just played Waterville. So we’ve been used to faster pitching. We just could not get around and were just getting little bloop hits.”

kmills@sunjournal.com