Twitter
Facebook
Reddit
Digg
Tell us what you think!Send a letter to the editor about this or any other article in The Maine Campus.
With plenty of Maine Day activities taking place on Wednesday, it was the softball game that proved to be most exciting.
Boston University traveled to Orono for a doubleheader with the Black Bears. Sarah Bennis gave up just three hits in the first game but Maine could not do much offensively against BU pitcher Ashlee Freeman. The Terriers took game one 3-0. In the second game Jenna Merchant, who pitched a 14 inning game on Saturday, took the circle. She pitched another complete extra inning game Wednesday. The game lasted 10 innings but Maine won 2-0.
The second game was a make-up game from earlier this season. In the top of the 10th with a scoreless game, Brittany Cheney and Molly McKinney each were on base. Sophomore Amy Kuhl, who batted .400 on the road trip last weekend, came up to bat. Kuhl, who had been cold all day, went 0-for-6 in the two games before her last at-bat and was due for a hit. The stage was set for Kuhl, with two on and a full count in the top of the 10th. She hit a double into right field, scoring both Cheney and McKinney and giving Maine the 2-0 lead. BU could not answer in the bottom half of the 10th as Merchant completed the shut-out for Maine. She gave up just seven hits on the game and struck out 12, improving her season record to 6-4.
“I was really concerned about the sinking sun,” Merchant said, as the sun began to set late in the game. “I didn’t know what was going to happen. I wanted to get out of here before they called it. Amy [Kuhl] made that good play and we just got out of there.”
In her last two starts, Merchant has pitched a total of 24 innings. Her Black Bears came up short in a marathon game Saturday at Albany, but the team was determined to back her up today.
“She has pitched two phenomenal games the last two starts,” said head coach Deb Smith.
Kuhl, a first baseman from Phoenix, Ariz., proved once again that she deserves a spot in the Maine line-up with her game-winning hit in the 10th inning.
“I just knew she was going to pull through,” McKinney said. “To get walked and then know that the person behind you can come back and get the big hit is really nice.”
“She did struggle a little bit today,” Smith said, “but she was clutch and that’s what we saw out of her last year and what we saw this past weekend.”
In the first game, BU took an early lead on a first inning run and never allowed Maine to score. BU made it 3-0 in the top of the fourth when Ashlee Freeman hit a double to deep center to score Chiya Louie from second. The third run came when Freeman came home on a wild pitch by Bennis. Although Bennis allowed just three hits and struck out seven in the complete game effort, she picked up the loss, putting her season record down a notch to 6-9.
Maine needed to win at least one of the two games on Wednesday, or else they would feel a lot of pressure to finish in the top four in the conference heading into their final weekend. To get a win against BU was big for a Black Bear team that needed a boost after losing five out of its last six games.
“The seniors haven’t even beaten BU, so this is just a big win,” said McKinney, who was 4-for-6 with a run and two walks. “It took us a while to get going but we eventually did it. It really puts us in a good place to make it to the conference tournament.”
Bangor Daily News