Pioneers Split with LIU Brooklyn Sunday

Sunday, April 7

12 pm

Sacred Heart University Department of Athletics

17-13, 3-4

LIU

7-30, 3-4

LIU Brooklyn

Sacred Heart

Pioneers Split with LIU Brooklyn Sunday

4/7/2013 12:00:00 AM | Softball

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

Fairfield, Conn. (April 7, 2013)—The Sacred Heart Softball team split with LIU Brooklyn in Sunday's doubleheader at Pioneer Park. The Pioneers took the first game 5-4 in the tenth inning. Then, in another close one, fell 3-2 in the latter game. SHU is not 17-14 on the season and 3-5 in NEC play.

Nicole Sidor (West Vancouver, BC) led the Pioneers with two RBI on the day. The senior went 2-for-5 at the plate with a double and a run scored. The other three RBI were split between Justine Sibthorp (Santa Clarita, Calif.), Kacie Wentworth (Canton, N.Y.) and Melissa Tobin (Hudson, Mass), who had the walk-off RBI in the first game.

Sidor picked up a win after pitching 10 complete innings in the first game. She gave up all four runs on seven hits, but only one run were earned as the Pioneers made four fielding errors in the contest.

The Blackbirds jumped out to a big lead in the first inning with the first three batters all coming around to score before Sacred Heart finally got the No. 9 batter for the final out of the half. The Pioneers fired back in the bottom of the inning with leadoff batter Kate Nadler (Southbury, Conn.) and cleanup hitter Sidor crossing the plate lessening the deficit to one run.

SHU managed another run in the fifth to tie the game at three, and held LIU scoreless all the way to the tenth.

With the international tie-breaker rule in effect, LIU's Madison Zymkowitz singled to centerfield driving in the go-ahead run before being tagged out at third.

Do or die time for the Pioneers, leadoff batter Annie Dreher (Saugus, Calif.) moved the runner over to third with a sac bunt before Sidor sent her home with a sac fly to centerfield. With the game tied Sacred Heart's bats came alive. Wentworth reached base after being hit by a pitch and moved around with Sibthorp's single and Courtney Machamer's (Williamstown, Penn.) hit. In dramatic fashion, with the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the tenth, Tobin came to the plate. The senior was plunked by a pitch forcing in the winning run.

Freshman Adrianna Mallory (Pine Bush, N.Y.) got the loss in the second game pitching 6.2 innings giving up three runs on eight hits, while striking out four batters.

Dreher and Jenn Robillard (Plainville, Mass.) picked up two hits each in the latter game, accounting for four of Sacred Heart's five hits.

Each team put a run on the board in the first inning. The Blackbirds took the lead with a run in the third, and the Pioneers tied the game with one in the fifth.

Heading into the seventh inning tied at two, LIU's batter Karina Cervantes lead off with a single. Two batters later, Lauren Morizi drilled a double to the left-centerfield gap knocking in the run. In an attempt to minimize the damage, Co-Head Coach Elizabeth Luckie called on Taylor Lane (Lisbon, Conn.) to finish out the inning. After her first batter reached on an error, Lane got the next two out, but the damage had been done as the Pioneers could not score in the bottom of the seventh.

The Pioneers host crosstown-rival Fairfield U on Tuesday in a single game before traveling to Stony Brook for a doubleheader Wednesday.