One big inning and a good pitching performance helped Florala beat Andalusia 4-3 Tuesday night in regular season softball action at the Dwight Mikel Sports Complex.

The Lady Wildcats scored three runs in the fourth inning to take a 4-2 lead, and sophomore pitcher Lily Ritzel struck out nine batters and allowed two earned runs on five hits in five innings to earn the win.

Earlier in the game, Ritzel suffered a left knee injury when she hit a foul ball off of her knee cap.

FHS softball coach Pat Maddox said he thinks his star pitcher will be all right.

“She’s a competitor,” Maddox said. “I think she’ll be OK.”

The Lady Wildcats coach said Bailea Rickett — who earned the save by pitching two tight innings — came in and handled the pressure well and just pitched.

After committing two errors in the top of the fourth that helped give FHS two runs of its own, Andalusia bounced back in the bottom-half of the inning to get within striking distance at 4-2.

The Lady Bulldogs added one run in the bottom of the fifth and had an opportunity to tie the game up in the seventh, but couldn’t get those needed runs across.

“We didn’t hit,” AHS softball coach Brad Garner said. “Lily Ritzel — she’s an excellent pitcher. That’s why when I did the schedule last year, I wanted to put them (Florala) on the schedule. We needed to face good pitching.

“We just didn’t do a good job with it (Tuesday night),” he said. “We’ve got to get better at it.”

Garner said those two errors in the fourth really cost the team.

“We eventually got to her (Ritzel) a little bit and got a couple people on,” the Andalusia coach said. “If you take away the two unearned runs, it’s a close ball game. The team that makes the fewest mistakes will win. We just made a few more than they did.”

Rickett went 2-for-4 with a double; Keadra Avan went 2-for-3 with two singles; and Kaitlyn Geohagan went 2-for-3 with two singles to lead FHS.

Rickett, Avan and Samantha Hammac all scored in the fourth inning.

Andalusia’s Jasmine Bryant, Emily Terry and Andi Hughes had one hit each.

AHS is back in action tomorrow at home against Hillcrest-Evergreen in area play. Florala starts its pool play in Straughn’s annual Kirsten Dean Memorial Softball Tournament tomorrow at 4 p.m.