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WASILLA — After losing seven seniors to graduation following the 2016 season, Wasilla head coach Tyler Gilligan thought 2017 might be somewhat of a rebuilding year for the Warriors softball program.
The only rebuilding that might need to be done is adding some space to the trophy case. Saturday, Wasilla rallied to beat West Valley to earn its third straight Railbelt Conference title. Now, the Warriors are headed to Fairbanks for the state tournament.
“This was supposed to be a building year for us,” Gilligan said. “The girls worked their tails off and turned this building year into a great year for us.”
Wasilla is among a half-dozen state qualifiers that will compete in a state tournament with a new format when the ASAA/First National Bank Large Schools State Softball Championships start Thursday at the South Davis Park Complex in Fairbanks. An afternoon of pool play Thursday will be used to determine the official bracket for the tournament, which starts Friday.
Wasilla will play twice in pool play Thursday, meeting East Anchorage at noon and West Anchorage at 5 p.m. In other action, South Anchorage plays West Valley at noon, West Valley meets Dimond and East plays West at 2:30 p.m., and Dimond faces South at 5 p.m.
The bracketed tournament begins Friday at noon and the championship game is slated for Saturday at 3 p.m.
Wasilla entered last week’s Railbelt Conference tournament as the No. 1 seed and opened with a 15-0 win over Lathrop during the first day. The Warriors played four games on the second day of the tournament, and won their final three to earn their third straight region title. After suffering a 5-3 loss to West Valley in the conference semifinals, Wasilla bounced back to beat Colony 9-1 in an elimination game. The win over the Knights put Wasilla into the championship game, and the Warriors beat West Valley 5-4. That forced the if-necessary game in the double-elimination tournament, and the Warriors rallied from a six-run deficit to beat the Wolfpack 8-7.
Contact Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman sports editor Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.
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