Michael Kiral / L’Observateur / April 27, 1998

LULING – Hahnville’s Jamie Picard held Slidell to two hits while striking out a career-high 16 batters to lead the Lady Tigers to a 4-0 victory bi- district playoff victory at West Bank Bridge Park Tuesday night.

Hahnville (23-2) will travel to Lake Charles to play LaGrange in the regional playoffs. Slidell, the third-place finisher in District 5-5A,finished its season at 13-10.

“I wasn’t nervous,” Picard, who moved to 19-1 on the season, said of her performance. “I didn’t feel I was throwing that hard during warmups butmy pitches were breaking good today.”Picard said that beating District 5-5A champion Covington in the L.A.Vixens tournament this past weekend helped.

“I felt confident knowing that we beat the winner of their district,” Picard said.

Picard set the stage in the first inning, striking out the side on 13 pitches. She would run the strikeout streak to four in the top of the secondbefore Danielle Naquin bunted back to her.

Hahnville coach E.J. Tassin said he wanted to score quickly and the LadyTigers did just that, plating two runs in the bottom of the first. ErinCrisham led off by beating out a bunt to Slidell pitcher Katrina Fonich and stealing second. After Crisham advanced to third on a wild pitch, KynaBoyer drew a walk and stole second.

Tiffany Cologne followed with a single to left field, scoring Crisham.

Angie Roussel then hit a grounder to short that bounced off Kerry Babuchna’s glove into left field as Boyer scored. After Picard groundedout, Fonich got out of the inning as Tyna Wells grounded out to third. Firstbaseman Amy Nolting took the throw and fired home to get courtesy runner Kelly Landeche with catcher Amanda Massa blocking the plate.

The game then turned into a pitcher’s duel between Picard and Fonich (13- 9), who Tassin said was the first left-handed pitcher he had seen since he started coaching softball.

Courtney Suarez reached Picard for Slidell’s first hit of the game with two outs in the third but Picard struck out Kiki Bullock to get out of the inning. Babuchna reached on an infield single with one out in the fifth butPicard came back to strike out Nolting and Suarez.

Fonich retired nine straight batters after a Picard single in the third before the Lady Tigers reached her for two insurance runs in the sixth.

With two outs Wells hit a grounder back to the mound that deflected off Fonich glove. Fonich tried to flip the ball to first with her mitt but Wellswas able to beat out the play.

After Wells advanced to third on a stolen base and wild pitch, Tricia McCully walked and stole second. Marcie Stewart followed with a grounderto second that went past Suarez into right field, scoring Wells and McCully.

Picard retired the side in order in the seventh, striking out Massa to end the game.

Tassin said the game went pretty much like he expected it to.

“We wanted to try to score quickly and hope to play defense,” Tassin said.

“We when got our first two girls on and scored, I felt pretty confident with our defense.”

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