CLERMONT, Fla. – The Carthage College softball team continued their spring break Saturday at The Spring Games at the National Training Center – Legends Way Ballfields, going 2-0 on the day with wins over the College of St. Scholastica and Bates College.
The sweep of Saturday's competition moves Carthage to 3-1 on the young season, while dropping St. Scholastica to 3-5 and keeping Bates winless at 0-8, despite being outhit in both games.
After battling through the Florida elements that included a downpour, gusty winds and a muddy field, the Lady Reds used a seven-run fourth inning to come back from a one-run deficit to eventually top St. Scholastica in five innings, 12-4.
Abby Thompson gave the Lady Reds an early second inning, 1-0, lead as she took the Saints' Micah McGuiness deep to left for Carthage's first homerun of the season.
Making her first start of the year,
Makenzie Walker worked some magic to escape bases loaded situations in the second and third innings and allowing only two runs to keep the Lady Reds in the game at that point.
"I thought Makenzie pitched a really good game despite the elements and what it did to the ball," said head coach
Amy Gillmore following the win. "We came out hitting again today which was really nice after struggling with it over the past couple years where we relied on our pitching, only spotting them two, three or four runs. This year it seems that the hitting is picking up our pitching and has really helped them out."
The Carthage bats came alive, somewhat, in the bottom of the fourth with Carthage erupting for seven runs to take the lead and never look back. The Lady Reds took advantage of two errors, two walks, a passed ball and a hit by pitch in the inning that saw
Jennifer Michuda,
Amanda Grove,
Kayla Uhwat-Vicicondi,
Aileen Szczepanski,
Vivian Juarez,
Shannon Walsh and
Kristine Herdegen cross home plate in the huge inning.
The Lady Reds finished-off the Saints in their next at bat with three unearned runs including the two that ended the game off the bat of
Hailey Rothstein that resulted in the Saints' fifth error of the game to seal their fate.
After an extended break due to the storm that had blown through the Clermont area in the afternoon, it looked as though Carthage was going to make quick work of Bates, as they did St. Scholastica earlier in the day, jumping out to a 7-2 lead with five-run third inning aided by two Bobcats errors.
Carthage pushed the lead to as many as eight in the fourth, 10-2, before Bates would begin to figure-out freshman pitcher
Amy Goldsmith, who had stifled the Bobcats the first three innings. In the fourth the Bobcats got to Goldsmith for five runs including a grand slam to cut the lead to 10-6 and bumped her from the game.
Carthage answered the challenge in the top of the fifth with three more runs to once again open the lead-up as Juarez, Walsh and
Darian Pelsor touched the plate in the inning.
But as they did in the fourth, Bates had another answer in the fifth. Bates would bat around in the inning getting to and knocking out Walker who entered in relief, touching her up for six runs on five hits in an inning of work to tie the game at 13-13.
Enter
Katie Herron. With the game tied, Herron allowing just one hit and walking one, while finding catcher
Jodie Hurd's glove time-and-time again, striking out seven-of-13 batters she faced in the 3.1-shutout innings.
After a scoreless sixth and seventh, Carthage would strike first in extra innings as Pelsor, who started the inning on second, was driven in on an
Abby Thompson single to right field.
It would prove to be enough as Herron returned to the mound and shook off a two-out fielding error, by getting Bates to lineout to Uhwat ending the game, 14-13, in favor of the Lady Reds.
"There were two big things that I pointed out to the team after the game. First, that despite Bates coming back from two big deficits, we didn't get down on ourselves s and quit, but we continued to hit the ball well. And second, Katie came in and shut them down. When she entered, they had all the momentum heading into the later parts of the game and she came in and shut the door on them. Obviously we don't want to give up those two big leads. But I am happy we came back, hit well, and took two today," noted Gillmore following the second win of the day.
Carthage will play their third straight doubleheader Sunday beginning at 3:00 PM at the National Training Center – Legends Way Ballfields when they face St. Catherine University followed by the University of Maine-Farmington at 5:00 PM.
