COLLEGEVILLE, Pa. – Kaitlyn Willis pitched a three-hit shutout and nearly replicated the feat in the second half of Saturday's Centennial Conference softball doubleheader, but McDaniel scored three runs in the eighth and survived a furious two-out rally from Ursinus to leave the teams with a split.
Willis twirled a three-hitter with nine strikeouts in a 5-0 opening shutout, then came right back with seven more innings of one-run ball in the nightcap. The senior did not allow an earned run and struck out 14 in 14 dominant frames.
Freshman Morgan Comfort backed Willis with a two-run homer in the first game, and junior Callie Crouse had a clutch two-run single to pull the Bears (10-6, 2-2) within 4-3 in the eighth inning of the second stint. But the late push came up just short as McDaniel (9-11, 3-1) hung on for a pulse-pounding extra-inning victory.
Game 1: Ursinus 5, McDaniel 0
Willis was on cruise control from the first pitch, flustering a powerful Green Terror lineup with expertly varied locations and speeds. The only hit she allowed through the first four innings was a ringing single off the bat of Tori Wilkins to open the second, and Willis got a big assist from her defense to keep the visitors off the board.
Megan Coyle sent a high fly ball to deep right, forcing junior Sammi Donato back just in front of the fence. Battling the sun, the ball skipped off Donato's glove, but she picked it up quickly and fired to junior Kayla Quinn, whose throw to the plate was in plenty of time to nab Wilkins for the second out. Willis got out of the jam on a pop-up to first base.
Willis was not in need of much help on this day, and she got all she needed in the first two batters. After Comfort led off the bottom of the first with a base hit, Quinn smacked a triple over the left fielder's head, scoring Comfort and sliding just ahead of the tag at third. She scored two batters later on junior Faith Carson's groundout.
After being held down for the next three innings, the Bears offense awoke again in the fourth, when Carson and junior Sammi Donato put up back-to-back singles with one out. After a deep fly-out moved pinch-runner Michela Coleman to third, junior Gabrielle Manto plated a big two-out run with a single that just tipped off the pitcher's glove and into no-man's land.
McDaniel threatened in the fifth with a single and a two-out walk, but Willis quickly put out the fire with her eighth strikeout, sitting Hailey Michael down on three pitches to preserve the 3-0 lead.
Comfort put more distance between the Bears and their foe, ambushing Valerie Lamb's first pitch and blasting it over the fence in left-center field for her fourth homer of the season, a two-run shot that made it 5-0.
Willis (5-3) was a model of efficiency, needing just 80 pitches to cut through McDaniel's lineup. She allowed three hits with two walks and nine strikeouts.
Comfort finished 2-for-3 and scored two runs.
Game 2: McDaniel 4, Ursinus 3 (8)
With plenty left in the tank, Willis came out to start Game 2 as well. McDaniel finally got to her in the top of the first, plating its first run of the afternoon when Tori Wilkins legged out an infield single with a runner on third and two outs. The ball got past senior Rachel Hyman at third, but Comfort ranged over form her shortstop spot and nearly gunned out Wilkins at first.
Cassie Rickrode made the first-inning run stand up until the bottom of the seventh. After Willis escaped a jam with runners on the corners and only one out by getting a double play on a bunt pop-up, Carson led off with an infield single and went to second on a groundout. Junior Callie Crouse's sharp single to left put Bears on the corners, but Rickrode got pinch-hitter Delaney Baker on a comebacker.
Down to its final out, senior Rachel Hyman delivered the tying single, bouncing one through the left side of the infield.
McDaniel answered right back in the eighth, which started with a leadoff double by Rickrode off Comfort, who had come in to replace Willis. Morgan Scandiona then ripped a base hit down the first-base line for the go-ahead run, and Taylor Hishon's RBI double tacked on another. Tori Wilkins added one more with an RBI single to make it 4-1.
Ursinus looked dead in the water after Rickrode retired the first two batters on three pitches. But four straight seeing-eye singles, the last a two-run knock by Crouse that ricocheted off the glove of both the pitcher and second basewoman, made it 4-3 and put runners on the corners. The Green Terror went to Fiona Johnson to close, and she struck out junior Gabrielle Manto swinging to end the Bears' late rally.
Carson was 3-for-4 in Game 2, and Crouse finished 2-for-4 with the big two-run single.
Willis pitched seven more innings, allowing five hits and one unearned run. She struck out five and walked two. On the day, the right-hander tossed 14 innings without conceding an earned run, striking out 14 and permitting only eight hits.
Up Next
The Bears host Muhlenberg in a CC doubleheader on Tuesday.