The Biddeford 8 to 10-year-old All-Star team celebrates winning a state championship on Thursday with a 4-2 win over Westbrook in Biddeford. The Tigers advance to a regional invitational tournament in Pennsylvania with the victory. (ANTHONY LOMBARDI/Journal Tribune)

BIDDEFORD – For three straight days, Biddeford faced elimination. And for three straight games, the Tigers clawed their way to victory. 

In a winner-take-all championship Thursday night, the 8 to 10-year-old Biddeford All-Stars defeated Westbrook 4-2 to capture the Maine Little League state title and advance to the East Region Invitational Tournament in Jenkins Township, Pennsylvania.  

Madison Roy had the game-winning RBI for the second straight night and starting pitcher Kayla Magnant struck out 10 batters in six innings.  

Kayla Magnant of Biddeford gets an assist from coach Andy Donovan after a lead-off triple to start the third inning of a Little League softball game on Thursday in Biddeford. (ANTHONY LOMBARDI/Journal Tribune)

“Scrappy, scrappy group,” said Biddeford coach Andy Donovan. “They’ve had their backs against the wall these last few days, and, I got to be honest with you, I think it was the best thing to happen to this group.” 

Biddeford travels to Pennsylvania this weekend with first-round action in the double-elimination tournament getting underway early next week. The Tigers’ opponent, date and time of their first game wasn’t known at the time of press deadline. 

Biddeford’s opponent on Thursday, Westbrook, was one the Tigers were familiar with. The two teams faced off for the third time since Sunday when Westbrook handed Biddeford its first loss of the tournament in a 4-2 nailbiter. 

“For about six weeks, we’ve been a little lackluster, and I’ve questioned the energy of this team,” Donovan said. “As soon as their backs were against the wall … they seemed to wake up.” 

Biddeford staved off elimination the first time with a 15-4 win over Ellsworth on Monday and then gave Westbrook its first defeat of the tournament on Wednesday in a 5-4 thriller in the championship to set up Thursday’s decisive Game 2. 

Roy broke a tie game on Wednesday with a two-run double in the sixth. She gave the Tigers a one-run lead with an RBI single to center field in the fifth on Thursday. Biddeford pushed across its fourth run of the game on a Mia Mariello sacrifice bunt one batter later. 

The two-run advantage was all Magnant needed as the right-hander recorded the next six outs via the strikeout. 

“As coaches, we call it the ‘it factor,’” Donovan said. “I don’t know what ‘it’ is, I don’t think you can coach ‘it,’ but these girls found ‘it’ once we had that loss. They didn’t like the taste of that … and hopefully they’re not going to taste it again.” 

Westbrook starting pitcher Addison DeRoche struck out 12 hitters in defeat and kept her team within reach by limiting the damage done by a Biddeford offense that put 12 runners on base. Westbrook’s two runs came in the bottom of the first on passed balls to the backstop.  

The first two Westbrook hitters reached base. Only six reached safely the rest of the evening.  

“You got to hit to win. They (Biddeford) did, we didn’t,” said Westbrook coach Joe DeRoche. “Biddeford stepped up. They had to beat us twice and they came through. I give them a lot of credit. They really played well.” 

After the game, Joe DeRoche gathered his team in a huddle and made sure they knew how proud he was of their performance in winning their district and reaching the state title game. 

Donovan and Biddeford have at least two games left in their season, and the Tigers feel like they are playing with house money. 

“Let’s go have some fun,” Donovan said. “We’re going to ride this high down to Pennsylvania and see what happens.”