LINK – ASHLAND UNIVERSITY SOFTBALL PAGE
SANDUSKY, Ohio – In a home doubleheader which really wasn't on Friday (April 26) at Sports Force Parks, Ashland University's softball team split with Davenport, winning the opener 3-2 and losing Game 2 6-5.
The Eagles remain in third place in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference standings at 32-20 overall and 17-13 in the league, while the Panthers stay in the No. 2 spot in the conference at 29-18, 21-9.
Ashland was scheduled to play Davenport at home, but with no fields in Ashland to secure due to the annual Wendy's Spring Classic softball tournament, the Eagles went to Sandusky. In road/neutral-site games in 2019, AU is 25-15.
MOMENTS THAT MATTERED
- Game 1 was moving at light speed thanks to the work of Ashland sophomore pitcher Laney Jones and Davenport hurler Mallory Teunissen. The Panthers scored first in the top of the third when Abby Merice, the GLIAC's leading hitter entering the day, snuck a two-run double down the left-field line.
- The score remained 2-0 until the bottom of the fifth, when senior center fielder Erika Farst turned on a Teunissen pitch and hit a two-run inside-the-park homer to knot the game at 2. For Farst, it was her third round-tripper of 2019.
- That set up senior right fielder Halle Dorko's heroics, as she launched a run-scoring double to left field to lift AU to a 3-2 advantage through six frames.
- Senior pitcher Hannah Stroe stranded a leadoff triple to start Game 2, but Davenport scored twice in the top of the third to once again strike first.
- An eventful third frame continued in the bottom, when the Eagles, following an 11-pitch walk drawn by junior second baseman Camille Pollutro, cut the deficit to 2-1 on a Dorko single, then took a 4-2 lead when senior third baseman Paige Summers ripped a two-run triple and scored on an error on the same play.
- Stroe kept Panther runners stranded at second and third with one out in the top of the fourth, but Davenport retook the lead at 5-4 with a three-spot in the top of the fifth, then added to its advantage with a run in the sixth.
- Down to their last out, the Eagles cut their deficit in half with an RBI double from sophomore shortstop Abigail Butler, but couldn't get the tying run to the plate.
STATISTICALLY SPEAKING
- Jones improved to 15-9 on the season thanks to twirling a complete-game two-hitter, allowing the two third-inning runs and two walks and striking out three.
- Game 1 ended in an efficient 73 minutes.
- Butler was 2-for-2 with an RBI in Game 2, and has at least one hit in eight of her last nine games.
- Summers scored twice and drove in two runs in the nightcap.
- Stroe (15-11) yielded nine hits, five runs (three earned) and three walks and struck out two in five innings.
NEXT UP
The end of the 2019 regular season on Saturday (April 27) at noon vs. Purdue Northwest (22-20, 13-15) at Baldwin Wallace University.
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