OKLAHOMA CITY – Emma Clarke stepped to the plate in the bottom of the ninth with all eyes on her.
The sophomore was 0-for-3 at the plate leading up to the moment, but it didn’t affect her. She watched the first offering pass her, but the next was too good to refuse. The pitch from Kaitlyn Terry came directly down the middle of the plate, and Clarke sent the ball 228 feet into right-center field to end the game 2-1.
In a game filled with big plays, it’s impossible to argue that hers was the biggest.
She trotted the bases slowly, embracing head coach Karen Weekly on the way to meet her teammates at home plate.
“Just so much joy,” Clarke said when asked about her emotions rounding the bases. “I had so many thoughts. But I immediately looked up and started to give God all the glory because I’m so grateful to be in this position. To be on this team with these people, to have opportunities to be in moments like this, even when they don’t work out. It’s literally such a blessing. I just couldn’t do it without the girls to my left and right.”
Her approach at the plate had been the same all night, even if the last three at-bats didn’t go her way. Clarke said she wasn’t hunting for anything specific, but she was just looking to put the ball in play.
“Honestly, just looking to swing at strikes and get something going for my team,” she said. “So being a leadoff, I just wanted to put the ball in play any way I could, and it worked out.”
It was a fitting end to a game that had swung in both directions. Tennessee scored first in the fifth inning, breaking the pitcher’s duel.
Taelyn Holley hit her sixth home run of the season to left field, a solo shot that would give the Lady Vols the lead until the seventh inning. A bases-loaded sacrifice fly knotted the game back up, and Alannah Leach prevented any more runs with a diving grab in left field.
After two scoreless extra innings, Clarke’s moment came.
Her walk-off shot was just the second walk-off Tennessee had at the WCWS, despite having 10 appearances.
Weekly knew this moment was no accident. In just a year, Clarke bumped her home run number from two to 14.
“She’s gotten stronger. You see the benefit of what she’s done in the weight room, how her body has filled out,” Weekly said. “She’s just a beast. I tease her every day because sometimes she’ll take a little something off her swing. I’m like, ‘Man, let the beast play.’ When she gets after it and releases the barrel with everything, good things tend to happen.”
Clarke’s impact wasn’t just limited to the walk-off. She nabbed two put-outs and six assists in the win while also being the team’s biggest hype man.
“Emma Clarke’s just like a ball magnet,” Karlyn Pickens said. “Every ball hit her way, she’s going to the field, they’re going to make a play. I think that just gives us the most confidence to be able to throw our pitches right in the zone, knowing our defense is going to be there to make the plays.”
With the win, Tennessee starts the WCWS 2-0 for the first time since 2013. The Lady Vols will advance to the semifinals, which will start on Monday, June 1 at 12 p.m. ET.
