Softball Advances To Saturday at NECC Championship
BOSTON – The Mitchell College softball team lost 5-0 to second-seeded Elms College on Friday at the 2011 New England Collegiate Conference Softball Championship before rebounding for a 3-1 victory against fifth-seeded Newbury College to stay alive in the double-elimination tournament.
Mitchell and Elms will face off once more on Saturday at 10 a.m. The winner of that game earns the right to play Lesley in Saturday's noon title game.
Game 1 - Elms 5, Mitchell 0
The Blazers jumped up in the first when leadoff hitter Alison McBride singled to left and advanced to third on a two-base Mitchell throwing error. She scored on a Jenna Lipscomb RBI groundout to short, putting the Blazers on top 1-0 after one.
Elms added two in the third when Lipscomb and Rachel Butt knocked back-to-back RBI singles, giving starter Destinee Meeker a bit of insurance.
While Meeker wouldn't need it, the Blazers addeded on two more runs in the sixth compliments of a pair of Mariners infield errors. The Blazers senior earned her 12th win with a walk-free, three-hit, five-strikeout victory in her fifth shutout of the year.
Lipscomb led the Blazers with a 2-for-3 day at the plate, scoring once and driving in two.
For the Mariners, Brittany Zaccaria went 2-for-3.
Game 2 - Mitchell 3, Newbury 1
Mitchell scored three runs in the sixth inning to pull out the come-from-behind win over Newbury.
Newbury got on the board in the fourth when Brittany Stracher tripled to the wall in center and was singled in by Joanna Robie. Nighthawks starter Rebecca Roach worked out of trouble early on, escaping two-on, one-out pickles in the first two innings. Robie's single put the Nighthawks on top in the fourth, which held until the sixth, when Roach entered a jam she could not escape.
Jen Bordonaro reached on a two-base throwing error to lead off the inning, and with two outs, Stacey Suplicki singled home Bordonaro to tie the game at 1-1. Tiffany Person's RBI double to the left-center field gap scored Suplicki, and Person came around on a Meghan Burke base hit to cap the three-run rally.
Newbury put two runners on in the top of the sixth but failed to get either across, as Mariners starter Marissa Thomas earned her 12th win of the season, striking out four and giving up only three hits. Nikki Hoxie went 2-for-3 for Mitchell.
For Newbury, which ended its season at 10-24, Stracher went 1-for-3 with a run scored, while Robie went 1-for-3 with an RBI.