CLERMONT, Fla. – The Illinois College softball team split a pair of contests on Monday, falling victim to Franklin College, 8-0, in five innings before coming back strong and claiming a 7-2 win over Thiel College. The Lady Blues are now 1-5 early on in the season.
Following an off day tomorrow, the Lady Blues return to action on Wednesday with games against Neumann University (10 a.m. EST) and Aurora University (12:15 p.m. EST).
Franklin 8, Illinois College 0 (5 innings)
Illinois College couldn't get anything going against Franklin starting pitcher Danielle Wyse and two errors in the bottom of the first inning helped the Grizzlies to score four runs, putting the Lady Blues behind the 8-ball right from the start.
The lone hit for Illinois College in the game was a lead-off double in the top of the second inning from
Skylar Dees, but she was later called out for leaving her base early. Franklin continued to cruise and pushed four more runs across in the bottom of the third to chase
Sydney Hood (0-2) from the game.
Alissa Hodge took over and allowed just one hit in the final 1.2 innings.
Down 8-0, Illinois College needed at least one run to keep the game going, but the Lady Blues managed just a single baserunner in the fourth and fifth innings combined. Wyse struck out the final two batters to end with nine in the game.
Illinois College 7, Thiel 2
Olivia Shimmin (1-2) and Hood combined to slow down Thiel in the early innings and the Illinois College offense got going early on to take a 4-0 lead after three innings of play. Three insurance runs in the sixth inning put it away as the Lady Blues earned their first win of the season.
After a 5-3 double play ended a Thiel threat in the top of the first inning, IC took advantage of a Thiel error to plate three runs in the bottom half of the inning. The bases were juiced when
Abigail Tepen doubled in
Annie Schimpf and
Maddy Morgan. The next batter,
Payton Dubberke, grounded out to bring Dees in from third.
Shimmin put the Tomcats down in order in the second and worked around a lead-off double to avoid any damage in the third. IC then added another run in the bottom of the inning on a double from Morgan and a RBI single from Tepen to make it 4-0.
Thiel scored one run in the top of the fourth although that base hit ended with the batter pegged out at second. Hood took over for Shimmin with one down in the top of the fifth and the Tomcat runner who was aboard came around to score before Hood got out of the jam and left the bases loaded with IC still out in front, 4-2.
Hood got Thiel in order in the sixth inning and the Lady Blues tacked on three big insurance runs in the bottom of the sixth. After the first two batters of the inning were retired, Illinois College collected three consecutive singles. The third, off the bat of
Sam Seggerman, brought
Jessica Belzer home to make it 5-2. As the inning progressed, a series of walks, passed balls and wild pitches allowed two more runners to make it home.
Hood closed out the save with a 1-2-3 seventh inning.
