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Box Score 2 ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - A pair of sacrifice flies brought in the winning runs on Tuesday afternoon as the Eckerd softball team ran its winning streak to eight games with a double-header sweep of Merrimack (Mass.) College, 9-1 and 3-2.
Both sacrifices came off the bat of
Chelsea Armstrong, the first finishing a run-rule victory in the opener in six innings while the second carried a bit more drama to the finish.
With game two a stalemate after seven innings tied 2-2, Eckerd (20-11-1) put its leadoff runner aboard in the eighth when
Carrie Shere ripped a double that landed on the left field line. A sacrifice bunt by
Rachael Luckett moved Shere to third, prompting Merrimack to issue intentional passes to both
Nikole Van Gennep and
Kayla Saylor loading the bases for Armstrong.
Armstrong then drove the first pitch she saw deep down the right field line. The ball was hauled in via an over-the-shoulder catch by Merrimack's Morgan Phipps, but Shere had no problems crossing the plate without a throw.
Grace Willeck (2-0) earned her second straight win, this one in relief of
Janna Gaburo who tossed the first seven innings. Willeck was dominant in one inning of work, striking out the side in the eighth.
After the Warriors scored a run in the top of the first inning of game two, Eckerd tied the game on a
Dana Paul sacrifice fly in the second and took the lead on a
Kaycie Duncan RBI single in the third. Merrimack, though, came right back with a two-out single in the fourth to tie the game at 2-2.
Neither team threatened again until the eighth inning, when the Tritons clinched their eighth win in a row as well as their third consecutive 20-win season - a first in program history.
The opener was certainly not as stressful for Eckerd as the Tritons jumped ahead early with a three-run second inning.Â
Kaleigh Floyd's double brought in the first run of the game ahead of a sacrifice fly by
Kaycie Duncan and an RBI single by Shere.
Shere delivered again in the fourth inning, smashing a three-run homerun (6) to left-center field to make it 6-0.
The Warriors ended Van Gennep's shutout bid on a solo homerun by Haley Currie to lead off the fifth, but the Tritons plated three more runs in the sixth to complete the run-rule win. Van Gennep narrowly missed a grand slam as her drive to right field hit the top of the fence but bounced back into play, instead resulting in a two-run double.
That drive put the Tritons on the cusp of ending the game early, and they did two batters later on Armstrong's sacrifice fly to deep center field.
Van Gennep (12-7) picked up the game one win, allowing just three hits in six innings while striking out four. Shere was perfect at the plate in the opener going 4-for-4 and finished a triple shy of the cycle. Floyd, Duncan and
Kiley King all had a pair of hits in the win.
Eckerd returns to action on Thursday at 3:00 PM, heading to Lynn University for a three-game Sunshine State Conference series.
