March 22, 2011

Box Score

CLINTON, S.C. - Western Carolina softball (13-17) was swept by Presbyterian College (16-5-1) 5-1, 10-2 Tuesday at the Presbyterian Softball Complex.

With one run in the doubleheader, sophomore outfielder Jordan Fulton is two runs away from moving to ninth in the Catamount record books. She currently has 49 in her career. Fulton also stole the 25th base of her career and three hits in the two games. Fulton also currently now has 85 hits in her career and needs four to move to ninth place for hits.

Fulton got Western Carolina on the board in the first inning, leading off with a double to left field. With one out, Erin Foster hit a sacrifice bunt, pushing Fulton to third. Freshman Kelly Braman hit an RBI single up the middle to score Fulton.

Western Carolina held onto a 1-0 lead over Presbyterian for four innings, before the Blue Hose tied the game in the fifth inning and took the lead in the sixth. The Catamounts dodged a couple of scoring bullets by Presbyterian College in the first and second inning.

Starting Western Carolina pitcher Bekah Burkett gave up back-to-back walks to start the Presbyterian bottom half of the first inning. After a Blue Hose sacrifice bunt placed runners at second and third, Western Carolina got a couple of key defensive plays, a PC runner called out at home and Burkett forcing a ground out for the third out.

In the second inning for the Blue Hose, Burkett peppered two strikeouts with a pair of walks, to again give Presbyterian a scoring chance. With two outs, the Blue Hose Tera Powell earned a trip to first off a Catamount error, but when Jennifer Marshall attempted to score, she was called out at the plate.

The Catamounts precarious 1-0 lead was evaporated in the bottom of the fifth inning. After teasing at scoring the previous four innings, Presbyterian finally got on the board off a solo homerun to centerfield by the Blue Hose Morgan Durham.

Presbyterian took the lead in the bottom of the sixth inning. Burkett gave up a pair of singles to the Blue and Powell hit a two RBI double to give PC the lead. Leslie Hensley capped off the inning with a two run homerun, the second homerun given up by Burkett in the game.

The Catamounts had just three hits while Presbyterian College had six. However, the Blue Hose made the most of its six hits stringing together two homeruns in the game. Burkett takes the loss for the Catamounts falling to 0-3. She gave up five runs on six hits and struck out a career-high six batters. She also gave up seven walks.

The second game began almost like the first for Western Carolina. Fulton led off with a single, her 30th hit of the season. Fellow sophomore Haley Pace had a sacrifice bunt, but she earned first base off a Blue Hose error. Fulton attempted to go home on the play but was called out. Braman struck again for WCU hitting an RBI single to right field to plate Pace.

Amber Steinhardt got the starting nod in the second game for Western Carolina. Presbyterian earned three runs and four hits off Steinhardt in the first inning to take the early Blue Hose lead. The Blue Hose benefitted from a pair of one and two RBI doubles.

The Blue Hose added two runs in the bottom of the third inning. Again, Presbyterian scored off two doubles, each a one RBI effort.

In the top of the fourth, Western Carolina came back and tacked on one run. Braman led off with a single, her second hit of the game, and moved to second thanks to a sacrifice bunt by Shemekia Scotton. Erin Foster followed with single past second base and Braman moved to third. With two outs, Steinhardt hit an RBI single to the right side, scoring Braman.

Presbyterian answered in the bottom of the fourth with five runs off five hits for a huge eight-run lead over the Catamounts, 10-2. The eight run lead halted the game at five innings.

Steinhardt takes the loss on the mound and falls to 7-6 on the season. She gave up nine runs on nine hits and struck out one. Megan Taylor got in 0.1 inning of work in the fourth allowing one run on one hit.

Western Carolina will travel to Samford on Saturday and Sunday for a Southern Conference series with the Bulldogs. The doubleheader Saturday begins at 1 p.m. with the single game on Sunday slated for 1 p.m.