The rumors of the Loreauville softball team’s downfall have been greatly exaggerated, at least to those who witnessed last week’s wins over Teurlings Catholic and Delcambre. 

On Tuesday, the Lady Tigers battled back from a two-run deficit in the final inning of the game to pull out an impressive 14-13 win over the Rebels, currently ranked No. 11 in Select Division I. 

The momentum carried over into Loreauville’s district homestand against Delcambre, where the Lady Tigers’ offense once again impressed in a three-inning, 15-0 mercy-rule win.

According to Loreauville head coach Jude Dugas, the wins come at an important point in the season. After entering April with an 11-12 record, Dugas began to grow concerned with how his offense was struggling. Led by senior Lexi McLinn, changes to the lineup have allowed the Lady Tigers to not only capitalize on their opponents mistakes, but also create scoring opportunities for themselves. 

“The offense is clicking now,” Dugas said. “We made a couple of lineup tweaks and it seems to be paying dividends. Lexi is protected. Our best hitter is after her and our slappers are before her when it turns over, so we have a lot of speed and protection behind her. If it gets to the point where they don’t want to throw it to her, we now have some protection to set the table nicely for us. On Tuesday, she was at bat with the bases loaded twice, so it’s paying dividends.”

Against Delcambre, McLin recorded yet another home run to kick off an 11-run first inning that proved to be too much for the Lady Panthers to handle. 

The offense wasn’t the only bright spot of the game, however, as freshman Megan Segura once again showed her quality in the circle. With just 32 pitches, Segura recorded a no-hitter and struck out one batter. 

Dugas said he was proud of how his team managed to take care of business quickly against a talented District 7-2A opponent. 

When you get into these situations, you kind of want to just put them away,” he explained. “In these district games, it’s always going to be tough. Throw the records out, it doesn’t matter, they’re always ready to play. You don’t want to give them any sort of life or let them hang around and get some energy, so we did a good job tonight of just putting them away early.”

The tenacity shown by the Lady Tigers is a return to form for the team that has expectations of deep playoff runs year after year. After making it to the quarterfinals in 2023 and 2024, Loreauville knows that the lessons they’ve learned this season will pay off in the postseason. 

“We’ve been preaching this all year and there was a lot of frustration earlier in the year that was weighing on us,” Dugas said. “We knew that going through those experiences would help us when the calendar rolled over to April. There’s nothing that they haven’t seen. I think we’ve played the No. 1, 2 and 3 teams in every class. We’ve played defending state champ after defending state champ and the breakthrough is happening.”

While the regular season draws to a close, the Lady Tigers can’t take their feet off the gas pedal just yet. Tough losses to St. Thomas More and Opelousas Catholic over the weekend lead into difficult games against Church Point, Lafayette, North Vermilion and Southside before the playoffs begin next week. 

Loreauville is currently the No. 12 team in the Non-Select Division III power ratings, six spots away from a first round bye. Should the Lady Tigers retain their spot, they would host a first round game against the No. 21 seed before traveling to the No. 5 seed in the second round.