By: Jennifer Jones
Director of Sports Information
jonesj@juniata.edu • juniatasports.net
Photo: TJ Chance-Chin
HUNTINGDON, Pa. – Elizabethtown College used big run innings to top the Juniata College softball team Sunday afternoon in the Eagles Landmark Conference home opener. Juniata (3-13, 0-2 Landmark) rallied late in game one before falling 14-5, and dropped game two 5-0. Elizabethtown (6-10) improved to 3-1 in Landmark play with the wins.
Sophomore Aly Smith (Mount Union, Pa./Mount Union) led the team with a .667 batting average. She went 2-for 3 on the day and knocked in one of the Eagles five RBI. Fellow sophomores Brooke Walls (Mifflinburg, Pa./Mifflinburg) and Holly Bettinger (Hummelstown, Pa./Lower Dauphin) also recorded two hits. Walls had a team-best two RBI. Bettinger earned the Eagles lone double of the day. She also put four innings of work on the mound and struck out a team-best two batters.
A big second inning in game one helped the Blue Jays take a commanding lead. But Juniata refused to quit and rallied in the bottom of the fifth. Freshman Nikea Ulrich (Homer, N.Y./Homer) led off the inning by earning a walk. Bettinger then singled up the middle and senior Rachel Smith (Martinsburg, Pa./Homeschooled) loaded the bases with a single of her own up the middle.
With one out on the board, sophomore Paige Dennison (East Berlin, Pa./Bermudian Springs) then singled to right field scoring Ulrich and ending the shutout. Elizabethtown's starter Laura Tomasetti then hit the next batter to send another run home.
Walls strode up to the plate with two outs and the bases still loaded. She drilled a ball into left field that sent R. Smith and Dennison home. A. Smith then singled through the right side, scoring one run before Walls was caught at the plate trying to squeeze in another.
The Eagles could not get the momentum of their bats back to counter the success of Elizabethtown's bullpen. They were able to get runners on in game two, but missed out on opportunities to score.
Juniata returns to action this coming Thursday, March 27 at home against St. Vincent College. The doubleheader begins at 3 p.m. on West End Field.
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