The third meeting of the season between the Northern Lakes Conference opponents went to the wire. With the bases loaded, the score knotted at 9-9 and one out, Ellie Krawze smacked a single to left-center field to plate Mal Krawze for the win.

Sidney Tomczak toed the mound for Florence, pitching a complete game, fanning four hitters.

“Sidney Tomczak is a fantastic pitcher, she had a lot of movement on the ball today,” said L-W co-head coach Danielle Peterson. “Florence played us well in both games in the regular season, and they really hit the ball well tonight.”

The Rebels loaded the bases in the final inning by building on earlier successes — finding gaps in the Bobcats’ defense for singles or bunting to move runners, or to get on base. In baseball language, L-W played “small ball.”

Florence senior catcher Ashelyn White sizes up a pitch in the fourth inning Monday at Laona, Wis.

“We live and die by small ball.” Peterson said. “It creates chaos for the other team’s defense and forces them to make plays under pressure.”

“There’s one thing about our girls, they never quit. They kept fighting and fighting the whole game,” said Florence head coach Dan Robinson. “That’s a very good team we played today. We made too many errors and that was a difference in the game.”

L-W got on the scoreboard first, in the bottom half of inning No. 2, with Kylie Higgins and Grace Krawze each driving in a run.

Trailing 2-0 to begin the third inning, Florence freshman leftfielder Victoria Peterson jumped on the first pitch and smacked it down the right- field line. Peterson ended up at third base as the ball got all the way to the fence and scored on a wild pitch two pitches later.

With the score 2-1 L-W, the Ladycats loaded the bases to bring up Paige Uren. The Florence junior smashed a 3-run home run to left-center as the Bobcats’ dugout and fans erupted with excitement.

The excitement continued for Florence as senior Lacey Enders cracked the next pitch over the right-center-field fence to increase the visitors’ lead to 5-2. Two pitches later, sophomore Morgan Tomczak mashed a solo home run of her own to deep center to increase the lead to 6-2.

Kiara Maravec was the starting pitcher for L-W. She was relieved in the middle of the top half of the third inning by Grace Krawze, who pitched the remainder of the game.

The Rebels (20-2) plated a run in the home half of the third inning, before Florence added two more runs, one on a L-W error, in the top half of the fourth inning to take an 8-3 lead.

With aggressive base running and well placed hits in the bottom half, the home team scored two runs to trim the lead to 8-5. In the fifth, the Rebels plated two more runs, which trimmed the Florence lead to 8-7. L-W tied the game in the bottom of the sixth, as Grace Novak drove in another run.

Uren cracked a double with one out in the top of the seventh inning, and later scored on Morgan Tomczak’s two-out double as Florence re-took the lead at 9-8.

The loss gave Florence a final record of 15-6, as the team says goodbye to three seniors, Enders, Sidney Tomczak and Ashelyn White. Tomczak and White each cracked doubles in the opening inning.

“I am going to miss our three seniors, as will the team,” Robinson said. “They all played key positions for us all season and played well for this program. Especially in the last couple of weeks, stepping up as the season wore on.”

Laona-Wabeno advances to the WIAA sectional finals on Wednesday for the first time since 2003.

Flor 0 0 6 2 0 0 1 — 9/11/5

L-W 0 2 1 2 2 1 2 — 10/16/2

HR: Uren, Enders, M. Tomczak