STANFORD, CA—The Winthrop softball team split on the opening day of the Stanford Invitational as it opened with a 5-4 win over Santa Clara before falling in the nightcap 8-7 to Princeton.
The Lady Eagles (9-13) gave up a lead in the seventh inning in the first game, but rallied back to win in the bottom of the seventh. It was the same story in the second game, but this time Winthrop was the away team and allowed Princeton to score four runs in the bottom of the seventh to suffer the loss.
"We battled today against two good teams," said head coach Mark Cooke. "We look forward to the challenge tomorrow as we continue to play some very competitive teams."
The first game of the day was full of excitement as the Lady Eagles gave up four runs in the top of the seventh to trail 4-2 before scoring three in the bottom of the seventh to capture the win.
Santa Clara’s Catherine Surane led off the seventh inning with a double to left center. Surane advanced to third after an Amanda Edmonson for runners at the corners and no outs. Emily Batt grounded into a fielder’s choice as Edmonson was thrown out at second, but Surane came across the plate to make it a 2-1 game. Noelani Ho'opi'i followed with a single up the middle to put runners at first and second. Christine Prochnow delivered a pinch-hit single to load the bases and Jenna Fong tied the game with a single to center.
Cari Wooldridge, at this point was pulled after a solid performance. Megan Evans entered the game and gave up a double to the first batter she faced. That made the score 4-2 as Briana Knight drove in two on a double to left field.
Evans proceeded to strike out the next two batters to end the inning.
In the bottom half of the seventh, Megan Chapman led off by reaching first on an error by the third baseman. Pearl Coleshille followed with a single up the middle to begin the rally. Tessa Thomas singled to right field, scoring Chapman. Coleshill came around to score on a bad throw by the right fielder to tie the game at 4-4. Lisa Kingsmore ripped a shot up the middle, scoring Thomas to win the game.
Thomas led off the first inning with a triple down the right field line and later scored on a sacrifice fly by Ashlee Revell. The Lady Eagles made it 2-0 in the fourth inning as Mallory Hogan led off with a single to right. Laura Schauman pinch-ran for Hogan and came around to score when Chapman walked with the bases loaded.
Wooldridge, who was on a pitch count as she still returns from missing nearly four weeks, allowed four earned runs on nine hits with no walks and five strikeouts in six and one-thirds.
Thomas, Kingsmore and Kelly Blea each had two hits in the game. Winthrop stranded six total runners in the game.
In the second game, Winthrop lost a 7-3 lead as Princeton rallied with four runs in the seventh inning. It was the second time on the day Winthrop pitching gave up four runs in the final inning.
Britteny Scott led off the seventh with a single and Nicole Ontiveros followed with a walk. Evans got the next batter to ground out to third, but the runners did advance. Evans got the second out as she got the next batter to fly out to right. But Evans could not get the final out as Kathryn Welch delivered a single to right center, that scored Scott and Ontiveros to make it a 7-6 game. The next batter, Kelsey Quist, ended the game as she hit a walk-off home run to left.
"Megan battled for us today and i'm proud of her effort," said Cooke. "In the second game I didn't have anyone to go to with Cari and Taylor Wright not available. She did a good job on the mound and at the plate."
The Lady Eagles jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first inning for the second time on the day and added another before falling behind 3-2 in the bottom of the third inning.
The offense responded with two runs in the fifth and two in the sixth. Evans tried to help her own cause as she doubled to right center to make it 4-3, Winthrop. In the sixth inning Evans had another RBI, this time a single to the left side. Revell also added an RBI single in the sixth.
Winthrop, leading 6-4, added another run in the top of the seventh when Coleshill tripled with one out and scored as Thomas followed with a triple.
Evans suffered the loss as she allowed eight runs on 12 hits with a walk and three strikeouts and is now 7-6 on the year. Evans also had a career-high three hits and three RBI in the loss.
Winthrop will be back in action on Saturday on day two of the Stanford Invitational as it takes on Pacific at noon and 4th-ranked Stanford at 4:30 p.m.
