Game One vs. Yale Box Score
Game Two vs. Colgate Box Score
Kissimmee, FL – After dropping its first game of the day against Yale, 4-0, the Wagner College softball team picked up its first win of the season, knocking off Colgate University, 4-2, in eight innings in the final day of the 2011 Rebel Games in Kissimmee, Florida.
It took an inning, but the Seahawks woke their bats up in the bottom of the second as Ashley Olsen (Staten Island, NY) blooped a one-out single into left field, followed by a rope double off the right-center field fence by Hailey Corthell (Reno, NV) that advanced Olsen to third. Alyssa McCulloch (East Brunswick, NJ) earned a two-out walk off Chelsey Dunham, but the freshman right-hander got Carley Nicoletti (Plainville, NY) to line out to third to end the scoreless inning.
It was Yale, however, who opened the scoring in the top of third with a one-out double by Jennifer Ong, followed by a RBI single by Mariclaire Rebman, who took Judy Betz (Ashburn, VA) to left field giving the Bulldogs a 1-0 lead.
Yale added two more runs to the board in the fourth on a four-hit Bulldog inning that included a blast double by Katie Yanagisawa and RBI singles by Ong and Meg Johnson that extended Yale's lead to 3-0.
After Wagner's two-hit second inning, Dunham set down the next nine straight Seahawks to take the game into the sixth inning 3-0. Freshman Ashley Rollins (Fairfax, VA) came in for Betz in the top of the inning to face the start of the Bulldog lineup. A leadoff walk by Chelsey Locarno and Ong's third of the game put two Bulldogs in scoring position with no outs, but Rollins found her groove to retired the next three hitters and keep the score at 3-0.
Yale switched out its pitchers in the bottom of the sixth, bringing in freshman Alex Lucas who had no issues in transition allowing just one hit in her two innings of work. Senior Christina Pinkus (Cohasset, MA) had the lone Seahawk hit in the final innings, knocking a single to right field in the bottom of the seventh. But the three-hit outing for the Seahawks wasn't enough, as the Green and White dropped their 12th straight game, 4-0.
Yale's fourth and final run came after a Tori Balta walk, who scored on a Wagner outfield error in the top of the seventh.
Betz was given her seventh loss of the year, allowing 10 hits in five full innings for the struggling Seahawks, while Dunham got her third win of the season as the Bulldogs improved to 4-1.
The Green and White would have one more chance to get into the win column before heading back north as Wagner took on the Raiders of Colgate University in the team's second game of the day.
The Seahawks opened the game with hungry bats, recording three hits in the first two innings, and bringing two runners into scoring position in the second inning, before being set down by Courtney O'Connell to keep the game scoreless.
Senior Amanda Garcia (Fresno, CA) took the circle for the Seahawks throwing two and two-thirds no-hit innings to start the game before the Raiders rifled off back-to-back singles in the bottom of the third. An intentional walk of Jennifer Ortega loaded the bases for Stephanie Hartquist, but Garcia got the junior to ground to third to end the inning.
Wagner got its bats going again in the top of the fourth, taking advantage of two Colgate errors that scored Olsen and Brittany Huss (Anthem, AZ) to give the Seahawks the 2-0 lead. Senior catcher Jamie El-Aazami (Houston, TX) earned her first RBI of the season on Wagner's second run, with a single to right field.
The Raiders got on the board in the bottom half of the fourth inning when Nicole Siedhof led off with a blast double to the outfield wall. Two batters later, Tera Vaughn's extra base hit scored Siedhof, making it a one run game.
Two innings later, the Raiders tied it up when Siedhof took the first pitch of the sixth inning and sent it over the left field fence for her first homerun of the year. Much like the fourth inning, Vaughn followed up Siedhof with a triple to the centerfield fence, putting the go-ahead run on the corner with O'Connell coming to the plate with one out. O'Connell thought she had a sac fly, taking Garcia's bid to right field, but Taylor Rauscher (Peoria, AZ) came up firing after the catch and gunned down Vaughn at home plate to keep the game even at two apiece.
O'Connell did her job on the defensive side of the seventh inning, getting all three Seahawks to fly out, sending the Raiders to the plate for a chance to win it. Rachel LeCoq led off the half with a single to centerfield, putting the winning run on first base. Garcia set down the next two Raiders and elected to intentionally walk Ortega, bringing up Hartquist as Colgate's last chance. Garcia's breaking ball got Hartquist to ground out to third base, sending the game into extra innings.
With the international tie-breaker rule in effect, the Seahawks opened the top of the eighth inning with Vanessa Lenart (Fontana, CA) on second base. After Rauscher went down on strikes, Olsen popped a single down the right field line that scored Lenart. Both Huss and Kristen Matteoni (Reno, NV) followed suit, lacing singles of their own through the middle of the infield as the Seahawks regained their lead 4-2.
As the Wagner defense took the field, it was Garcia who took over, downing the first three Raider hitters to seal the, 4-2, Seahawk victory.
The win snaps a 12-game losing streak, with Garcia picking up her first victory throwing a complete game, eight-hit outing. O'Connell was given the loss for the Raiders who fall to 2-4 of the season.
The Green and White will have a much needed week off from competition before traveling to north to Sacred Heart and Bryant on March 26th.
