Box Score

ROCK HILL, SC— Winthrop led early, but couldn't get the offense going as it fell 3-1 to Charleston Southern in the third game of the series Sunday afternoon.
 
The game, televised on ESPN3, saw the Eagles suffer a series sweep at the hands of the Buccaneers and have now lost 10 straight. Winthrop is now 11-20 on the season and 0-4 in Big South Conference play. Charleston Southern improved to 18-13 and 3-0 in conference play.  

Head Coach Mark Cooke said, "Not having Megan Chapman made a big impact, we are hoping she'll be back for next weekend. We have to hit the ball with runners in scoring position and we haven't been doing that. When your team is in a collective hitting slump, it seems like nothing can go right."
 
The Buccaneers came out swinging and missed an early opportunity to score in their first at bat of the game. Kristin Kelleher got the offense started with a one out single to left field. Jessica Brock followed with another single to left field and got to second base when McKenzi Corn threw out pinch runner Lizzy Olmstead trying to get to third base on the play. Eagles' pitcher Chelsey Schoenfeldt ended the threat by getting Jana Matthews to ground out to the shortstop.
 
Taylor Wright got the Eagles' offense started in the bottom of the first with a two out double off the left field fence. Schoenfeldt, the Eagles' RBI leader, helped herself on the mound by driving a shot to the right field fence to score Wright to give the Eagles a 1-0 lead. Mel Andrea drew a walk to put runners on first and second for Alex White but she grounded out to end the inning.
 
Charleston Southern answered back with a leadoff double from Stephanie Sbardella to start the second inning but could not bring her around to score. She advanced to second base on a sacrifice bunt from Hannah Wagner. Trea Steele then hit a hard shot to Kristy Noble at second base for a single but it wasn't enough to score Sbardella. Schoenfeldt got out of the inning by getting the next two hitters to pop up and ground out to Noble.
 
The Buccaneers tied the game in the top of the third inning. Megan Lombard led off the inning with a single up the middle. She advanced to second on a sacrifice bunt from Kelleher and moved to third on a single down the right field line from Brock. She scored on a ground ball to the shortstop from Matthews. Schoenfeldt was then replaced by Natalie Becker in the circle and got the Eagles out of the inning without any more runs being scored.
 
Charleston Southern took the lead in the top of the fourth inning and scored two more runs on two hits. Linzy Rother pinch hit for Melanie Stickney to lead off the inning and drew a walk. Stickney reentered the game and advanced to second base on a sacrifice bunt from Melissa Adams. The next two Buccaneers, Lombard and Kelleher walked to load the bases for Brock. She hit a looping line drive to Corn in left field and who almost had a sliding catch but dropped it to allow the Bucs to take the lead 2-1.Matthews followed with a single up the middle to drive in the third run for her team.
 
Teja Durante got the bottom of the fifth inning off to a promising start for the Eagles with a line shot right field. Corn followed with a ground ball to first base that was bobbled enough to allow Durante to get to second base. Kathryn Eberlin popped out to second base for the second out of the inning to bring up Schoenfeldt with two outs and a runner on second base. She hit a ground ball to the pitcher to end the inning for the Eagles, stranding Durante.
 
Becker was lights out in the sixth and seventh innings, the only base runner for the Buccaneers was Sbardella who got hit by a pitch. In the game, Becker had four strikeouts, only gave up three hits and had four walks in 4.2 innings pitched.
 
Noble singled with two out in the bottom of the sixth inning but was stranded after Kelly Blea grounded out to third base. The Eagles were retired in order in the seventh inning and lost 3-1.

In the game, the Eagles had one run and five hits. Durante extended her hitting streak to four games with two hits today. Noble had one hit today and extended her hitting streak to seven games. Both players have reached base in the last eight games. Wright and Schoenfeldt also recorded hits for the Eagles today. Schoenfeldt drove in her 21^st run of the season.

Dowdy tossed her third complete game of the weekend allowing the one run on five hits and improves to 12-6 on the year.

Brock was the only Buccaneer multiple hits as she was 3-for-4 on the day.

The Eagles will be back in action at Terry Field on Wednesday, March 28^th vs. South Carolina at 7pm.