COLUMBIA, SC— Winthrop softball split on its first day of the Carolina Classic earning a 6-1 win over UNC Greensboro before falling to Longwood 7-1, Saturday afternoon.
The Eagles are now 3-5 on the year while UNCG is 4-4 on the year and Longwood improves to 2-1. Winthrop will wrap-up the weekend on Sunday, Feb. 21 with a 10 a.m. contest against Ohio and then face host South Carolina at 3 p.m. with that game airing on the SEC Network-plus.
"I feel like we're growing up," said Winthrop co-head coach
Mark Cooke. "I thought our performance was a big improvement over last weekend. Dallas (King) threw the ball well today, as did Bradlee (Holeman). In the second game we just made some mistakes and it got away from us."
The Eagles opened the day with their third straight win behind the arm of senior
Dallas King as she allowed one run on six hits with two walks and five strikeouts to improve to 2-2 on the year.
Winthrop held a 2-1 lead heading into the fifth and opened up the game with three runs.
Paige Haley walked to lead off the inning and moved to second when
Leah Young tried to sacrifice her over but reached herself on a poor throw by the catcher. Two batters later, freshman
Blake Wallert put the Eagles up 3-1 with an RBI single to left, scoring Haley. With two outs and two on,
Haley Zuehlke grounded to the shortstop on the first pitch but the shortstop committed an error that led to Wallert and Young scoring for a 5-1 lead.
Young finished the game with two hits while Haley scored twice and seven different players recorded at least one base hit. It was third straight game in which Young and Wallert got a hit and the fourth straight game that Haley reached base.
Nicole Thomas took the loss in the circle for the Spartans as she allowed five runs on five hits with two walks and a strikeout in 4.1 innings.
Longwood grabbed the lead in the third inning on an RBI single to right by Glenn Walters. Then Krista Kelly followed that with an RBI double to left. At that point Cooke made a pitching change to
Bradlee Holeman and she was able to get out of the inning without any more damage.
Longwood added another run in the fourth and four more in the fifth. Leading 3-0 heading into the fifth the Lancers plated four runs on three different RBI singles.
Winthrop had a chance to take the lead in the second when Wallert doubled with one out, but Zuehlke popped up to the pitcher for the second out. Then after
Kim Ryder was plunked, the inning ended with a grounder as Ryder was out at second on the fielder's choice.
In the top of the fifth the Eagles were in scoring position again as Zuehlke walked and then stole second with two outs, but
Morgan Lowers flied out to left to end the threat.
The Eagles did spoil the shutout in the top of the seventh as
Tara Loken drew a leadoff walk.
Madison Templeton replaced her as a pinch-runner and advanced to second on a wild pitch and then moved to third on a fly out by Wallert. Then Zuehlke drove her in with a ground out to second.
Freshman
Keleigh Romine started the game in the circle as she tossed 2.1 innings allowing two runs (one earned) on four hits as she falls to 0-1 in just her second start of the season. Longwood's Elizabeth McCarthy tossed five shutout innings allowing one hit and striking out nine with two walks to earn the win in the circle.
