SOFTBALL: Eagles Post .500 Weekend

Coming in with nine straight losses, the prospect of six games in three days is  daunting. The Boston College softball team had to face exactly that situation this weekend as they participated in the University of South Florida tournament. 

Despite the negative trajectory that the team was on leading into the weekend, the Eagles saw an upturn and came away from the weekend with three wins and three losses.

The first contest of the weekend for BC was an early game against Temple on Friday. 

An error to start the bottom of the third inning for BC sparked an offensive flurry for Temple, who struck first. Things opened up as the Owls put three runs on the board. The Eagles put up a small response in the top of the fourth with a run of their own. They ended that inning, however, still down by one.

Two more runs by the Owls led Temple into the final inning up by five, and a three run effort in the bottom of the seventh was not quite enough to secure a win, with a final score of 6-4.

The day was not over for the Eagles, as they faced a 1:15 start against Colgate. After a 10th straight loss, BC finally snapped the streak with a 7-5 win.

The Eagles started the game right with a run in the top of the first while holding the Raiders scoreless, but the game had a back and forth nature until the very end, as the Eagles entered the seventh inning down by one. Megan Cooley, Maria Pandolfo, and CJ Chirinchigno came through for BC when it mattered most, though, and their three runs set up the 7-5 BC win.

Coming off of the encouraging win, the Eagles did it again the next day with another late inning win over Radford.

It took until the top of the first for either team to get on the board, when the Highlanders broke through with an unearned run on a wild pitch. Unable to respond in the bottom of the third, the Eagles went down 2-0 in the fourth.

It was then that the stagnant BC offense kicked into gear, and three hits resulted in three runs. Two more scoreless innings led the teams into the seventh with the Eagles leading 3-2. Radford tied the game for a fleeting moment, but as Tory Speer took the field as BC’s first batter of the seventh, she put the game to rest with a walk off homer that gave the Eagles the 4-3 win.

The next contest was against LIU Brooklyn. Though the Blackbirds took an immediate 3-0 lead, the motif of the weekend continued, as later innings saw increased scoring by the Eagles, allowing them to pull out a last-minute win.

The teams entered the final segment of play tied at four and the Eagle defense came through late in the game to keep LIU Brooklyn at four runs. 

A walk and a single for the Eagles left the two runners on base when Speer took the plate and slammed home her second walk-off homerun of the day, this time batting in three runs and giving the Eagles a 7-4 win.

The Eagles awoke early on Sunday morning for a 9:30  start against Rutgers. This time it was early offensive efforts that kept the Eagles in the game, but in the end the Scarlet Knights proved too much for BC at the end of this long, play-packed weekend.

High scoring innings were the story of the game as Rutgers scored four, three, five, and another three in the first, second, third, and sixth innings, respectively.

The sheer volume was too much for the Eagles to keep up with, and a sixth inning mercy rule ended the game 15-6.

With their final opponent of the weekend, Cornell, in front of them, the Eagles had one final chance to finish off a long weekend of play on a positive note. 

The Big Red went on board first, scoring one run in the bottom of the second, but Speer quickly answered with yet another homerun, this time scoring one run to tie the game. Cornell quickly regained their lead, though, and led by two until a Pandolfo two run homerun put them up 4-3.

Cornell answered and took the lead in the fourth, and eventually extended their margin to 8-5. Though they put up one more in the sixth, the Big Red held them off for a 8-6 win.

Though the weekend ended on a negative note, the Eagles put up three wins to snap a ten game slump and give them a boost heading into regional play during the week.