ROCK HILL, SC— Winthrop softball dropped a doubleheader with losses of 8-0 and 4-3 to league-leading Liberty, Saturday afternoon at Terry Field.

The Eagles fall to 23-27 on the year and 8-10 in the Big South as they concluded their home schedule for the season. Liberty improves to 34-18 overall and 15-3 in the league. Winthrop will be off until Saturday, May 6 when it returns to action for a three-game series at Radford to wrap-up the regular season.

"That last game was a great ball game," said Winthrop co-head coach Mark Cooke. "We know we could have a chance to run across them in the conference tournament and we know we can play with them. We proved that we can compete at their level. They're leading the conference and we could see why. We played pretty hard and gave them everything we had."

The Eagles were three outs away from taking the series from the Flames. Amber Bishop led off the inning with a single to left and moved over to third on back-to-back ground outs. Then on a 2-2 pitch Sarah Robertson singled to center to tie the game. After a Jaclyn Amader single, Kiley Majette got a grounder to short as Maddie Antone scooped it up but her throw to first was off the mark as Robertson came around to score the go-ahead run.

Antone led off the bottom of the seventh with a single down the left field line. Madison Templeton pinch-ran for Antone and moved to second two batters later after Leah Young singled with one out. That brought up Madyson Watson, who already had two hits on the day. Watson ripped a 1-0 pitch toward left center, but the shortstop reached up and grabbed it and proceeded to whip a throw to second to get Templeton trying to retreat to second for the double play.

After Liberty took a 1-0 lead in the top of the first the Eagles responded as Ashley Westbrooks came through with a two-out single to center, scoring Paige Haley after she led off the inning with a double.

The lead grew to 3-1 after two innings as Shayna Covington singled to third base and with the bases loaded. Covington hit a grounder out of reach of the third baseman as it skipped off her glove and redirected toward second base. With nobody around, Watson hustled around third to score and make it a 3-1 game. Liberty made it a one-run game in the fourth on an RBI double from Bishop.

Majette tossed a complete game allowing four runs (three earned) on 11 hits with three walks and four strikeouts as she falls to 13-14. Julia DiMartino pitched 5.1 innings of relief to earn the win as she allowed no runs on seven hits with two walks and one strikeout to improve to 16-8.

In the first game of the doubleheader the Eagles fell behind 4-0 in the first as Liberty took advantage of a couple of errors. Liberty loaded the bases with no outs and Keleigh Romine got a grounder to third base. Young fielded the grounder, tried to step back to touch third and get the force out but was too far away so she threw the ball home. The throw was low and hit the bat lying in front of home plate and then rolled toward the Liberty dugout. That allowed two runners to scored and left runners at second and third with no outs. Robertson singled up the middle, scoring both runners for a 4-0 lead.

The Flames doubled their lead in the fifth inning as Autumn Bishop pushed the first run across on an RBI single up the middle. Two batters later Robertson hit her second home run of the season with a three-run shot to left center for an 8-0 lead.

Winthrop finished the game with five hits and left eight runners on base. The best opportunity in the game came in the third inning when the Eagles loaded the bases with one out. However, DiMartino got Morgan Lowers to strike out and then Young to line out the left to end the threat.

DiMartino improved to 15-8 on the year as she allowed no runs on five hits with two walks and five strikeouts. Romine started in the circle for the Eagles as she took the loss and falls to 4-9 after allowing four unearned runs on two hits in one inning.

Westbrooks extended her streak to nine straight games reaching base, Haley extended her streak to eight games while Antone extended her hitting streak to six games. Haley, Covington, Antone and Watson all had three hits combined in the doubleheader.