CAUGHT IN THE CROSSFIRE

4 Kingfisher County players ‘make them quit,’ help lead team to softball national title

They made them quit.

A group of softball players from rural towns in northwest Oklahoma traveled to Music City USA recently and pulled off the improbable.

They won a national title. The Oklahoma Crossfire - a group of young ladies from the likes of Drummond and Waukomis and Seiling and Ringwood - went 12-1 over five days to win the 14-under USSSA Southeast National Championship in Nashville, Tenn.

They also hailed from Kingfi sher and Dover and Hennessey.

Four members of the Crossfire were from Kingfisher County and played a massive role in the team’s journey to a national championship, which included winning seven straight elimination games on Saturday, July 6.

That includes Kendall Farrar, who will be a freshman at Kingfi sher High School this fall.

The daughter of Josh Farrar and Keri Johnston, Farrar was named the tournament’s most valuable player thanks in large part for her blistering hot bat.

The team also consisted of Farrar’s KHS classmate Lily Voth, the daughter of Joe and Kayla Voth.

Paityn Koehn will be a freshman at Hennessey High School this year and is the daughter of Amber and Josh Koehn.

A newcomer to Kingfisher County, but not to the Crossfire, is Riley Voth, who will be a sophomore at Dover High School.

Her dad, Pete Voth, was recently named Dover’s new baseball coach.

He’s also one of the architects of the Crossfire, which was nothing more than an idea about 3 1/2 years ago…now it’s a national power.

•••

Pete Voth and Amber Koehn were looking for a competitive atmosphere for their daughters to play softball.

Voth was coaching at Kremlin- Hillsdale at the time and Koehn lives in Hennessey.

Competitive traveling teams aren’t overly difficult to come by…but for those in rural areas, traveling isn’t just designated for games.

It means making multiple sometimes daily - trips to the Oklahoma City metro area or Stillwater or another larger city.

“We wanted to get some girls together who were passionate about playing and play more competitively,” Koehn explained. “And instead of traveling to Oklahoma City, we decided to form a team here.”

And so the group of Broncos (now a Longhorn), Eagles, Yellowjackets, Wildcats, Chiefs, Bulldogs and Red Devils began to grow together as a team.

The season began this year in April when the group posted a 9-3 mark. Crossfire then went 6-2-1 in May and 11-2 in June, which led up to the national tournament.

All went according to plan early on - and mostly in dominant fashion.

The team opened the tournament July 2 with a 17-0 thumping of Madison County Chaos. They ended the day with a 12-2 victory against K25 Pride.

The group had just one game on both July 3 and 4. They beat Ap-Locke 2010 by a score of 8-0 on that Wednesday and then got a 12-1 holiday victory against Purple Haze.

Things tightened up a bit in the first game on the Friday of the tournament. Crossfire won, but was challenged for the first time in beating Downers Grove Outlaws 8-5.

Then came the setback. Pryme Costello 09 defeated Crossfire 9-1.

Ironically, that team was also from Oklahoma. Its roster boasts players from Broken Arrow, Catoosa, Bixby and Mannford.

The loss made a run to the national title unlikely.

Crossfire was essentially going to have to play from dawn to dusk on Saturday, July 6, to claim a championship.

It started at 9 a.m. and the team advanced with a 6-3 win over Athletics Mercado Ridge.

One down. Six to go.

•••

Cindy Koehn had been sick for some time.

The mother of Josh Koehn, the mother-in-law to Amber and the grandmother to Paityn, her health had Josh’s ability to travel to Nashville up in the air.

But in the days leading up to the trip, Cindy appeared to be doing better.

Josh left with the team. However, not long after the tournament began, word got to Josh that his mother’s health was declining… and rapidly.

On Thursday, July 4, he flew home to be with his mother.

Before he got out of the car at the Nashville airport, he had a message for Paityn: “Hit one out for grandma.”

In theory, it sounded great. In reality, Paityn had never hit a home run in fastpitch softball.

But early in the second game on Saturday against the BNGSA Angels, she stepped up to the plate… and with the bases loaded, no less.

Moments after a freight train passed by in the outfi eld, Paityn swung at the first pitch she saw and launched it over the left-center field fence.

Grand slam. “As a pitcher, she doesn’t show much emotion. Things can be going bad and she doesn’t show it. Things can be going great and you wouldn’t know it,” explained Amber.

But the grand slam - that home run for Grandma Cindy - at least elicited some form of reaction.

“I think she did smile and she pumped her fist,” Amber said.

Paityn admits she felt some emotion.

“I was excited to be able to hit one over for my grandma,” Paityn said. “And it made it that much more special having the bases loaded.”

The grand slam turned out to be big. Crossfire won 8-4.

“Those were our first four runs,” Amber said. “And they made a difference.”

After the game, Amber wanted a picture of Paityn with her home run ball.

The pitcher’s mentality had returned.

Paityn had no time, she told her mom. There was another game to play.

•••

Amber and Paityn Koehn made it home to Hennessey late last Sunday night.

They woke up early Monday morning to visit Grandma Cindy, whom doctors had sent home and were making her as comfortable as possible.

Cindy Koehn passed away about an hour later.

She did so after one last visit from her daughter-inlaw and granddaughter and ensuring Paityn Koehn had a great story to tell about her first home run…one that helped win a national championship.

“And,” added Amber, “I think she held on long enough to know that everyone had made it home safe.”

•••

After Paityn’s home run spurred the win in the second game of the day, Game 3 on Saturday saw the Crossfire eliminate Carolina Chaos 12-1.

Then came a showdown with yet another Sooner State team, the Oklahoma Stroke, which is based in Ada.

Crossfire sent the Stroke back to southeastern Oklahoma by beating them 7-3.

That landed Crossfire in the national semifinals against Voodoo Preston, a team from Massachusetts.

Voodoo became the fifth victim of the day as Crossfire emerged with a 4-2 victory.

The victory earned Crossfire a rematch against Pryme Costello, the very team that had thumped them the day before.

However, Pryme Costello sat in the driver’s seat.

The team was without a loss in bracket play, meaning Crossfire would have to beat them twice to win the championship.

And for the majority of the game, it appeared Pryme Costello was poised to win the championship unscathed.

The Tulsa-area team led 3-0 through five innings.

But Crossfire came alive in the sixth.

Lily Voth put the team on the board with a two-run double.

Farrar later laid down an RBI sacrifice bunt to tie the game at 3-3.

Aleah Melson of Waukomis drove in Voth with an RBI single, putting Crossfire up 4-3.

Pryme Costello got the tying run on first base, but the game ended when Seiling’s Taycee Cooper made a diving catch in center field.

Six down. One to go.

•••

Josh Farrar had a motto for his team before all their games: “Make them quit.”

Farrar is one of four coaches on the team along with Pete Voth and Joe Voth (who are first cousins) and Jared Pitchford, an assistant baseball coach from Drummond.

Their emergence allowed Amber Koehn to stop coaching and take on more of an administrative role with the team.

“I wanted to step back a little bit and not coach,” she said. “And they have four great coaches with those guys.”

Farrar’s mantra became a rallying cry for the team.

“They even got these little press-on tattoos that said ‘#MakeThemQuit’ and wore them all week,” Pete Voth explained.

After Crossfire had completed its comeback and saved it in dramatic fashion against Pryme Costello, Riley Voth noticed their body language.

“We won it,” she told her dad.

When he stated the obvious back to her - that Crossfi re still had to win another game - Riley didn’t flinch.

She saw the body language of the team on the other side of the diamond.

They may not have quit yet, but Riley knew they weren’t far from it.

Kendall Farrar put them a lot closer early in the final game of the day.

The tournament MVP belted a first-inning tworun home run to kickstart a 12-1 victory for the national championship.

Farrar didn’t stop there. She added another two-run hit in the third inning, giving her two hits and 4 RBIs for the game.

Koehn also had two hits and drove in two runs, capping an epic day that saw the team play for the better part of nine consecutive hours.

All four county players played an immense role in bringing home the national championship trophy and rings.

Riley Voth didn’t have her best tournament at the plate as she hit .192 and drove in four runs over the 13 games.

However, she caught 32 2/3 innings and led the team in putouts. She was a perfect 38 for 38 in those chances.

Four baserunners tried to steal against Riley and she threw out two of them.

Lily Voth and Paityn Koehn were key not only at the plate, but in the pitcher’s circle as well.

Voth hit .433 (14 for 30), drove in 11 runs and scored 12 times. She had four doubles in the tournament.

As a pitcher, she was 4-0 with 18 2/3 innings of work. She struck out 23 batters against just two walks. Only four of the eight runs she allowed were earned, giving her a 1.50 earned run average.

Koehn batted .452 (14 of 31) with 19 RBIs and seven runs scored. She had two doubles and - of course - the grand slam.

Koehn also pitched 13 innings and had a 3-1 record. She struck out seven and only walked two and finished with a 5.25 ERA.

Farrar proved to be the toughest out of the tournament.

She hit at an amazing .697 clip (23 for 33), which included four doubles, three triples and two homers.

She knocked in 20 runs and scored 19 times.

For the season, the team went 38-7-1 and, according to Josh Farrar, were champions off the field as well.

“These 10 girls from small schools in northwest Oklahoma are different than most travel ball teams,” he said. “There was zero drama, zero jealousy and they’ve all become really close friends.”

It just turns out they’re pretty good at softball, too, and proved to have the hearts and wills of champions that last grueling day.

Or, as Josh Farrar put it: “We #MadeThemQuit.”

Pete Voth agreed and eventually realized what his daughter saw much sooner.

“They were leading us early, but we stopped the bleeding and hung in there,” he said about that first championship game. “And then when we beat them, it took the fire out of the other team. We still had it.

“They were a gritty group of girls.”