Softball team splits with UVU
A pair of fielding errors left USU softball with a split in an afternoon doubleheader Tuesday against Utah Valley University in what head coach Candi Letts hoped would have been a sweep of the two games.
“We dominated both games,” Letts said. “But we had certain miscues that led to a loss in one of them.”
The Aggies lost a close one in the first game, 6-5, before blowing out the Wolverines in the second game, 7-0.
Utah State took the lead early in the first game scoring two runs in the first inning on a rally started by a double by junior Nicole Rupp. Rupp scored on a single by Rayna Bradshaw, who then scored off a single by Simone Hubbard and an error by Wolverines’ left fielder Lauren Augino.
UVU led off the bottom half of the first inning with a home run by Meghan Woodworth to narrow the Aggies lead to just one run. Utah State once again took a two-run lead in the top half of the third inning on a RBI double by Jasmine Harris that scored Bradshaw from second base. UVU answered again in the bottom half with a RBI double of their own to bring the narrow the Aggie lead again to just one run.
Utah State put up another two runs in the top of the fifth inning only to have those two runs answered by UVU in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Entering the bottom of the seventh inning, the Aggies held a 5-4 lead behind a solid 12-strikeout performance by pitcher Lindsey Benson. The game unravelled from that point on.
“We had a couple miscues,” Letts said. “They got the lead runner on from an error, another error for the tying-run and got the go-ahead run into scoring position.”
With the game tied and runners on first and third, UVU senior Kylee Steadman hit a walk-off single to right field scoring teammate Magan Niemann for a 6-5 Wolverine win.
Letts said, “It’s definitely frustrating because we’d outplayed them the whole game.”
The second game of the doubleheader held a much different final result for both teams. Utah State took the lead on a solo home run by Megan McDonald on the second pitch of the game and never looked back.
“We kept our foot on the accelerator the whole game, as opposed to the first game where we took our foot off the accelerator at times,” Letts said. “I think it was just the fact that they were so mad that they let that first one slip away.”
After a scoreless second inning, the Aggies exploded for five runs in the top of the third inning. Three of those runs came off the bat of Harris who launched her fifth home run of the season with two runners on base. Harris hurt the Wolverines again in the fourth inning with a RBI double to score Rupp from third base to give the Aggies their seventh run of the game. Harris combined to hit 5-for-6 with two doubles on top of the home run to round out her day.
Kate Greenough put the icing on the cake of USU’s offensive explosion in the second game by throwing a complete-game shutout, allowing just five hits, two walks and tallying eight strikeouts.
The split leaves USU’s record on the season at 8-22 with 21 games remaining on the season.
–matt.sonn@aggiemail.usu.edu