By RYAN ARENA

L’Observateur

SULPHUR – Riverside Academy is headed to the Class 2A state championship game after defeating Evangel 5-2 in the state semifinals.

The Rebels (27-7) are set to face archrival John Curtis (30-1) at 5 p.m. today at Sulphur’s Frasch Park. Curtis is the top seed in Class 2A, Riverside the second. It’s a rematch of last year’s state semifinal game, won by John Curtis.

Evangel has twice been a recent roadblock for Riverside, besting the Rebels in the 2012 Class 2A semifinals and the 2011 quarterfinals.

“It feels great to break through,” said Terrio. “We’ve finally made it here.”

Said Riverside coach Kristy Hebert, “We finally broke that curse of losing in the semifinals. But we can’t be satisfied with that. We came here to win a championship, so now we’ve got to finish it off.”

Erica Delaneuville’s two-RBI double in the first inning gave the Rebels an early lead they wouldn’t relinquish.

The Rebels took a 4-0 lead in the third inning, scoring on a Destin Vicknair groundout and a Evangel throwing error.

“We wanted to come out hard and put a lot of pressure on them,” said Terrio, who led off the game with a single. ”

Destin Vicknair took the win on the mound for Riverside, going the complete game and striking out eight. She allowed two hits; Vicknair has allowed just three in 14 tournament innings so far.

Evangel scored two fourth inning runs, but Riverside was able to hold the Eagles from there. The Rebels added a fifth run in the fifth inning on Vicknair’s sacrifice fly, after a Madison Watson leadoff double.

Riverside defeated DeQuincy 8-0 in the quarterfinal round Friday night to advance. 

Vicknair struck out 16 batters in that game, tossing a 1-hit shutout. Delaneuville colected two RBIs and Terrio reached base in all four of her at-bats.