MERRY HILL – After a moment of silence with both teams joining hands in the pitcher’s circle honoring former Northeast Academy player Robyne Barnes, who died tragically Monday in an auto accident, Lawrence Academy and Ridgecroft School played a softball game here Tuesday afternoon.

The Lady Warriors won the Tarheel Independent Conference contest 8-3, one day after they downed Terra Ceia on the road 18-3 in five innings to open league play.

Brinson Edmundson went three-for-four for Lawrence in the Ridgecroft game while Kayla Hoffman, Lauren Baker, and Katlynn Stotesberry went 2-for-4 with Stotesberry driving in a pair of runs.

Tuesday, Stotesberry scored Baker on a sacrifice fly for Lawrence’s first run and a 1-0 lead after one. That held until Ridgecroft scored a pair in the fourth as Tracy Hughes drove in one and later scored the go-ahead run for a 2-1 Lady Ram lead.

It was 3-1, Ridgecroft in the bottom of the sixth when Lawrence exploded for seven runs. Hoffman doubled to left and advanced to third on a groundout then scored on a single to right by Smithwick. Megan Davenport and Baker reached on an error and a fielder’s choice to load the bases. Smithwick scored as Rebekah Goodwin reached on an error and Davenport scored as Hayley Noles walked. Baker and Goodwin scored on a single to left by Stotesberry, with Noles scoring when Hoffman reached on an error. Stotesberry scored the final run on an error.

Ridgecroft got a one-out walk, but left the run stranded thanks to a strikeout and a ground-out to end the game.

Baker got the win in relief of Stotesberry for Lawrence while Ruthie Daniels took the loss for Ridgecroft.

“We had a lot of positives come from this game in that we were ahead and playing well against a top-five team in Lawrence,” said Ridgecroft coach Jon Northcott.

Monday Lawrence scored seven runs in both the third and fourth innings to pound Terra Ceia, 18-3. Baker went 4-for-5 at the plate and got the win in the circle with three runs on two hits and had nine strikeouts.

Lawrence is 5-3 and 2-0 in conference; they’re also off until April 4 when they host Hobgood. Ridgecroft is now is 1-4 and 0-2 in the TIC and has Terra Ceia at home at 4 p.m. later today (Thursday).