April 3, 2015
| 11 | 8 |
| 13 | 14 |
| Friday, Apr. 2, 2015 | |
Goodman Diamond | Madison, Wisc. | Attn. xxx
| POST GAME LINKS |
| Play-By-Plays: Game 1 | Game 2 |
| Game 1: Box Score (HTML) | (PDF) |
Game 2: Box Score (HTML) | (PDF)
| FINAL STATISTICS |
MADISON, Wisc. -- The Penn State softball team scored a combined 24 runs and knocked out 26 hits enroute to a doubleheader split with Wisconsin, Friday night in Madison. The Lions took the first game 11-8 and fell in the night cap 14-13 in the bottom of the seventh inning.
In game one, the Badgers put three on the board early off starter Jessica Cummings (Owings, Md.), but a solo shot off the left field foul pole by Kristina Brackpool (Valencia, Calif.) in the second accounted for the Lions first of two dozen runs on the day.
After Wisconsin added to its lead in the bottom half of the second, PSU plated another in the third before putting a five spot on the board in the fourth to take a 7-4 lead. The Blue & White pounded out its five runs on RBI singles by Reina Furuya (Waipahu, Hawaii) and Lexi Knief (Ramsey, N.J.), coupled with a two RBI single by Macy Jones (Ashburn, Va.) and a wild pitch, which allowed Knief to scamper home.
After her performance at the plate, Jones went into the circle from leftfield in relief for Cummings, staked to a three run lead.
Unfortunately the lead would not hold up for long as UW tied it up in the bottom half of the inning with a three spot before taking the lead the following inning on a two-out RBI single.
Down 8-7 in the sixth Penn State surged back, aided by a Knief leadoff double and then an RBI double by Shelby Miller (Sugar Land, Texas), sandwiched in between a Mollie Sorenson (Stevenson Ranch, Calif.) single to make it 8-8.
The Lions took the lead for good on an Alyssa VanDerveer (Hillsborough, N.J.) sacrifice fly and then added some insurance runs on a Brackpool RBI double.
Jones kept the Badger bats quiet in the sixth and shut the door on a Wisconsin rally in the seventh with the bases loaded and the winning run at the plate. That's when she got UW third baseman Kelsey Jenkins swinging to earn her fifth win of the year in the circle and the Lion's 20th win of 2015.
The second game was the Nittany Lions' most wild one of the season, featuring a combined 17 runs, 28 hits, three lead changes and only one inning without any crooked numbers being placed on the Goodman Diamond scoreboard.
It began with Amanda Lehotak's club giving starter Marlaina Laubach (Northampton, Pa.) some cushion as they pushed across four runs in the first, thanks to VanDerveer's team leading eighth home run of the season and amazingly her second grand slam in just four games.
Undeterred, the Badger offense plated three in the bottom half of the first to cut the deficit to just one.
After a scoreless second, Penn State scored three in the third by playing small ball but then Wisconsin added a two in the bottom half of the third to make it 7-5.
The two clubs traded a pair of runs in their respective halves of the fourth, making it 9-7, with Brackpool accounting for her team's runs on her second RBI double of the day, this time of the two run variety.
Cummings then came into relief for Laubach following a leadoff walk in the fifth and the Badgers grabbed their first lead of the night with three in that half inning to make it 10-9.
The sixth had a Hawaiian flair to it as after a Maegan Tupinio (Wahiawa, Hawaii) RBI single, Furuya laced a three-run homer to center field to put her team up 13-10, with both island natives accounting for all four Penn State runs in the inning.
Still, the Badgers chipped away at the Lion lead putting two more on the board in the bottom of the sixth. After a scoreless PSU seventh, Wisconsin tied the contest up at 13-13 with a single to left with two on and no one out.
Marissa Diescher (Livingston Manner, N.Y.), then entered the game in relief for Cummings with the winning run on second. That runner moved up to third on a passed ball and after an intentional walk the bases were loaded with UW runners and no outs.
Badger centerfielder Maria Van Abel then came to the plate and hit a chopper to the left side, enabling the winning run to score in walk-off fashion and in the process putting an end to the marathon three hour contest.
Cummings was the hard luck loser in game two and fell to 4-6, while Penn State moved to 20-17 overall and 3-5 in the B1G.
Despite the one up, one down day a number of Blue & White batters had monster nights at the plate as Knief went 4-5 in the second game and 6-10 overall in the twin bill with an RBI and four runs scored. Sorenson was equally as hot, going 5-9 as she scored a pair of PSU runs, while Jones was 4-6 with five runs scored and three RBI.
The battery of Brackpool and VanDerveer accounted for 10 of Penn State's 24 runs on Saturday as combined they went 4-11 with three walks and four runs scored.
The Nittany Lions have now amassed double digit run totals in four of their last six games and won three in-a-row and seven of their last eight before dropping the night cap to Wisconsin. They will look to take the rubber game of the three game set Saturday, as first pitch in Madison is slated for 12 p.m.