California Box Score
Hawai'i Box Score

HONOLULU, HI— The Winthrop softball team lost a couple of tough games to some of the nation's best Saturday evening as it fell 7-1 to top-ranked California and 2-1 to 18^th-ranked Hawai'i on the final day of the Chevron Spring Fling Invitational.

Winthrop suffered its sixth straight loss and falls to 11-16 on the season after facing five Top 25 ranked teams in the last six games. The top-ranked Golden Bears are now 22-1 on the year as Hawai'i is 24-2.

After falling to top-ranked California, Winthrop battled Hawai'i until the end as it fell in the bottom of the seventh inning on a sacrifice fly by Jessica Iwata. The inning started with back-to-back walks to put a runner in scoring position with no outs. Then Chelsey Schoenfeldt replaced Natalie Becker in the pitching circle and was then called for an illegal pitch, which moved the runners to second and third. Becker came back to pitch and struck out Sarah Robinson before giving up the sacrifice fly to Iwata.  

The first run for the Rainbow Wahine came in the bottom of the first inning as Kelly Majam led off the bottom half of the first with a solo home run to center. Becker held the Rainbow Wahine in check over the next six innings until giving up the game-winning sacrifice fly.

Trailing 1-0 in the third inning, Winthrop tied the game after a double by Megan Chapman to lead off led to the tying run after she moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on a sacrifice fly by McKenzi Corn to center.

Becker suffered the loss and falls to 5-8 on the year after allowing two runs on six hits with seven walks and seven strikeouts.

Hawai'i's Stephanie Ricketts earned the win in the circle as she allowed a run on six hits with a walk and eight strikeouts as she improved to 14-2 on the year.

In the first game of the day, Winthrop gave up three runs in the first to the Golden Bears as the first run was scored on an error and the next two runs were scored on RBI doubles. California added another run in the fourth and three more in the fifth before the Eagles spoiled the shutout in the top of the seventh on an RBI single up the middle with two outs by Teja Durante.

Becker started the game, but lasted just 0.2 innings as she allowed three runs on three hits.

Five different players for Winthrop recorded hits against California as Schoenfeldt finished with two on the day and has a five-game hitting streak going. Kelly Blea was named to the All-Tournament Team at the catcher position.

Winthrop will be back in action on Thursday, March 22 when it opens Big South Conference action against Campbell at 6 p.m. at Terry Field.