BLOUNTVILLE—After a long rain delay and playing on a far from dry field, Morristown East saw its softball season come to an end Wednesday as host West Ridge rolled to an 18-0 rout to open the District One 4A Softball Tournament.

A late afternoon downpour left a lot of water standing on the field when the East bus pulled in at + about 5 p.m. for the scheduled 6 p.m. start and the game didn’t begin until just after 7:30 after lots and lots of work and who knows how many bags of field conditioner.

But the surface was far from perfect, especially around the mound and middle portions of the infield.

But that didn’t hamper the Lady Wolves who scored eight times in each of the first two frames and cruised to the win. The win moved West Ridge, now 20-15, into the double-elimination part of the tourney, where they faced regularseason champ Science Hill on Thursday.

Zoey Blair didn’t allow a base runner for the Lady ‘Canes in a three-inning perfect game.

At the plate, Nila Horne collected two singles and two doubles for the Lady Wolves. Kat Hortenstine clubbed a grand slam in the first to lead an 11-hit attack. Hortenstine also had a single and Maranda Henley chipped in two safeties.

The Lady Hurricanes closed the least successful season in school history, setting new records for fewest wins with one and most losses with 27.

East coach Leslie Clemmons said, “It’s certainly not the kind of season we had hoped for, and I really hate to see my three seniors (Jaycee Hamilton, Jaelyn Valentine, Macy Davis) have their careers end like this.

“But it was a rebuilding year and we made a lot of mistakes along the way that really hurt us.. But my girls battled to the very end and kept working to improve.”

Blair was in control from the start as she struck out two in the three frames. Shortstop Horne made a great play to rob Jaycee Hamilton of a hit leading off the second, and the rest of the outs were pretty much routine. East didn’t hit a ball to the outfield.

Hamilton was the losing pitcher and had control problems dealing with the muddy circle.

In the first, West Ridge took advantage of four hits, six walks and two East errors to pour across eight markers and then combined five hits, two walks, an error and a hit batter to double the score in the second.

Freshman Paige Horner pitched the final inning.