By CURTIS ROCKWELL

Item Sports Editor

POPLARVILLE — Poplarville and Picayune ended the regular season in exciting fashion against one another Thursday in a final tune-up for the state slow pitch softball playoffs.

The Lady Hornets came from behind to nip the Lady Tide 5-4.

The win moves the fourth ranked Lady Hornets to 20-1 on the season, and they have now won 18 games in a row.

Picayune, meanwhile, dropped to 13-5 overall.

Allysa Graeter came up big both on the mound and at the plate in the win, as she picked up the pitching victory to remain perfect on the year at 19-0 and she also smacked a two run homer.

Picayune took the early lead thanks to a grand slam home run by Brandi Rabion.

But Graeter’s homer, along with a pair of RBI’s from Janessa Dedeaux helped the Lady Hornets rally. Dedeaux, in fact, drove in the game winning run in the fifth.

“Picayune came in and gave us a challenge,” Poplarville head coach Jonathan Ray said. “They made us pick our game up and we needed that with the playoffs coming up.”

Picayune head coach Kristi Mitchell agreed that the game was a good tune-up for the postseason.

“I think it helped both teams, it was a great game between two good teams,” Mitchell said. “We picked up our level of play and our intensity level is where it needs to be for the playoffs.”

Both teams will open the playoffs at home on Tuesday, as Picayune hosts McComb and Poplarville hosts Northeast Lauderdale. Both best of three series will begin at 5 p.m.

The Poplarville-NEL series is a rematch of last year’s opening round series which the Lady Hornets won.

Mitchell said McComb will be a new opponent for the Lady Tide, and she couldn’t remember facing the Lady Tigers before.