March 30, 2014
Box Score - Game One (L, 3-2) |
Box Score - Game Two (W, 1-0)
Canton, Ohio - Playing for the first time in over three weeks, the Grand Valley State softball team finally got back on the field and opened conference play with a doubleheader split at Walsh on Sunday afternoon (Mar. 30). The Cavaliers topped GVSU in the opener with a 3-2 walk-off victory before the Lakers came back to earn a 1-0 victory in the nightcap.
GVSU last took the field on Mar. 8 in Clermont, Fla., capping off a 9-2 spring break trip with wins over Notre Dame College and Wilmington. The Lakers had sported an overall record of 11-4 for the last 22 days before Sunday's action. With the split, Grand Valley State is 12-5 and 1-1 in GLIAC play, while Walsh is 11-10 overall and 1-3 in league games.
Walsh took an early 2-0 lead in game one off GVSU starting pitcher Sara Andrasik. A pair of two-out RBI singles from Abby Reusser and Anna Anderson gave the Cavaliers the advantage, which they would hold until the sixth inning.
With one out in the top of the sixth, senior Briauna Taylor was plunked by a Casi Rohr offering, which put Taylor on first base and gave her the new GVSU career record with 15 hit by pitches, breaking a tie with Julie Wieczorek (1998-2001). Classmate Miranda Cleary followed with a double to left field and was replaced by pinch runner Megan Downey.
Next up was senior Tonya Calkins, who also doubled - this time to left center - and brought in both Taylor and Downey to knot the score at 2-2. Neither team would score in their next at-bats, but Walsh started off the bottom of the seventh with a leadoff triple from Chelsey Testa. That was the first three-bagger Andrasik has allowed in her career.
After Andrasik struck out the next Cavalier hitter, Sam Troxell laid down a bunt and brought Testa home for the game-winning run. Rohr (6-5) picked up the win for Walsh, striking out 10 batters in seven innings of work, allowing just four base hits.
Andrasik (5-3) pitched well in the loss, allowing three runs on eight hits in 6.1 innings. She walked two batters and struck out four. In addition to Cleary and Calkins, sophomore McKenze Supernaw and freshman Jenna Lenza also had one base hit apiece.
Game two saw a dominant pitching performance from Laker junior Lauren Gevaart. GVSU was able to spot her a run - the only one she would need - in the bottom of the first inning. Lenza led off with a single, moved to second on a sacrifice bunt from freshman Janae Langs, and was pushed to third on a single from Taylor. Cleary then delivered the game's only run, driving in Lenza with a run-scoring groundout.
That would be enough run support for Gevaart, who struck out the next six batters she faced in the second and third innings. It was a stretch of seven consecutive K's for Gevaart, who did not allow a base hit until the fifth inning when Jordan Monnot reached on an infield single.
Rohr pitched again in game two and kept things close at 1-0 entering the seventh inning, when Walsh appeared that it would finally break through on Gevaart. Eryn Simon led off the frame with a double to center field and Marissa Bondoni followed with a bunt single, though Simon had to stay at second base.
Gevaart took over at that point, getting a fielder's choice groundout, a fly ball, and a strikeout looking to end the ballgame. She moved to 4-0 on the season by tossing the complete-game three-hitter. The junior fanned nine Cavaliers and walked two to outduel Rohr (six innings, four hits, one run, six strikeouts).
Taylor was the lone player in game two with more than one hit, as the shortstop went 2-for-3 and added a stolen base.
The Lakers will stay in Canton to take on Lake Erie on Monday morning. Those games against the Storm will begin at 10:00 a.m. on Walsh's field.
