HOT SPRINGS --- The Marion softball team has gotten pretty good at playing in close games this spring. That trend continued on Thursday afternoon at Hank Aaron Field at Majestic Park. Marion led 6-1 in the top of the seventh before watching Lake Hamilton score four times prior to the Patriots recording the final out to strand the tying run at third base, and the go-ahead run at second base for a 6-5 victory. The Patriots improved to 18-10 overall in 2022, as well as 5-4 in one-run games, and will advance to Friday's quarterfinal round against 5A West champion Van Buren (19-6) at noon at Majestic Park. Marion sophomore starter Anna Hitchman's record improved to 6-2 after working seven innings, scattering nine hits, and allowing five runs (three earned). Lake Hamilton hurler Madie Duke absorbed the loss. Junior lead-off batter Kelsey Baker sparked the Marion attack by reaching base four times (2-2 with a double, a run, a walk, and a hit-by-pitch). The all-conference performer walked and scored the game's first run when McKenzie Shinabery (1-3 with a double, an RBI, and a run) laced a first-inning double down the left-field line. Shinabery came to the plate when Hitchman reached on an error and Marion led 2-0 after one stanza. Lake Hamilton scratched a run out in the top of the second with a walk, single and a sacrifice fly, but Marion was back at it in the bottom of the third when sophomore outfielder Kelsey Eppes (3-4 with two runs and an RBI) doubled and scored on shortstop Brianna Morquecho's clutch single and the Pats led 3-1 after three frames. Eppes plated Emerson Miller in the fourth inning with a single, and Eppes came around on Hitchman's scoring single that pushed the Pats ahead 5-1 in the bottom of the fourth. Eppes led off the sixth with a single and she scored on a passed ball for a 6-1 lead. Nobody knew it at the time, but Marion's sixth run would prove significant. The first seven Wolves would reach in the top of the seventh inning, though Marion did turn one baserunner into an out. Lake Hamilton got within 6-5 on an RBI single by Abby Dalton, and when Dalton took second on defensive indifference, the Wolves had the tying run at third, with Dalton representing the lead run at second. That's when Hitchman induced a pop-out to second base before Emerson Miller ended the game with an athletic play going to her left to retire the side and move Marion to the quarterfinals for the second year in a row.