Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 The Carthage College softball team (23-13, 8-6 College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin), seeded fourth, opened play at the CCIW Softball Tournament on Friday, May 2 with a 3-2 loss to top-seeded and No. 12 Illinois Wesleyan University (35-5, 12-2 CCIW) at the Illinois Wesleyan Softball Field in Bloomington, Ill. 

In the second round, also on Friday, the Lady Reds eliminated third-seeded and No. 26 North Central College (29-11) by an 11-1 margin in five innings.  Carthage advances to a Saturday, May 3 semifinal game against No. 19 Augustana College (Ill., 32-10) at 10 a.m.
 
The tournament got underway with second-seeded and No. 19 Augustana (Ill., 32-9, 10-4 CCIW) edging North Central (29-10, 9-5 CCIW), 2-1, in a first-round game.  Illinois Wesleyan (36-5) defeated Augustana (32-10), 4-2, in Friday's fourth-and-final game.  Saturday's championship round gets underway at Noon.  The winner of the tournament receives the league's automatic qualifier to the NCAA Division III Softball Championship.
 
In the loss to Illinois Wesleyan, Carthage loaded the bases in the third off Titan starting pitcher Molly McCready, who issued a bases-loaded walk to Katie Morman to give the Lady Reds a 1-0 lead.  Illinois Wesleyan took a 3-1 lead in the bottom of the third on a solo home run by Kyley McKeown, a fielder's choice-RBI off the bat of Allie Riordan and another fielder's choice-RBI by Danielle Burge.  Bryanna Heckel (Sr., Kenosha, Wis./Salem-Westosha Central) homered to lead off the seventh, and Carthage trailed by a run, 3-2.  Vicki Pyan walked, but McCready got Katie Morman and Abby Hanson on outfield flies to end the game.
 
Tina Campbell (Sr., St. Petersburg, Fla./Lakewood) started the game for the Lady Reds and worked the first two innings before giving way to Darian Pelsor (Fr., Villa Park, Ill./Willowbrook).  All three runs in the Illinois Wesleyan third were charged to Pelsor, who did not record an out in the inning.  Jessica Kirby (Fr., Bartlett, Ill.) entered the game in the third and pitched the rest of the way, blanking the Titans on no hits and a walk over the final four innings.  Molly McCready (20-2) was the winning pitcher and allowed two runs on five hits, four walks and nine strikeouts.  Bryanna Heckel went three-for-three with two runs scored for Carthage.
 
In the win over North Central, Carthage took a 4-0 lead in the first inning on a pair of two-run homers by Corinne Sheley (Sr., Naperville, Ill./Neuqua Valley) and Abby Hanson (Sr., Winthrop Harbor, Ill./Zion-Benton Township) off Cardinals starting pitcher Vlasta Mangia.  The Lady Reds made it 8-0 in the second on a double by Sheley, a two-run single by Vicki Pyan and a run-scoring single by Katie Morman.  After North Central scored a run in the top of the third, Sheley connected on a two-run homer in the bottom half, and the score was 10-1.  Abby Hanson followed with an RBI-single to make it 11-1, and that closed out the scoring.  The game was halted after the Cardinals batted in the fifth due to an eight-run rule.
 
Corinne Sheley had a big game, going three-for-three with a double, two home runs and five RBI.  Katie Morman (Sr., Kenosha, Wis./Somers-Shoreland Lutheran) also went three-for-three.  Makenzie Walker (Fr., Kenosha, Wis./Bradford, 8-3) was the beneficiary of Carthage's 14-hit onslaught.  Walker allowed just one unearned run on eight hits and no walks over five innings.  Vlasta Mangia (10-5) took the loss.