NEW LONDON, Conn. –
In a league doubleheader rescheduled from Sunday, Coast Guard dropped both ends of the twin bill to WPI. The sweep improves WPI to 22-11(11-5 NEWMAC). They will travel to West Hartford to face the University of Hartford Hawks tomorrow at 4:00 PM.
Game one started off on the wrong foot for the Bears and they were unable to recover. With the help of six CGA errors, WPI scored three in the first, two in the second, and three in the third to take a commanding lead. The Bears would get three runs of their own in the second to cut their deficit but were unable to push across more in the following innings.
Abriana Schmutz(Marysville, OH) tripled in
Madeline Kibler(Effingham, IL) and
Emma Behel(Ellicott City, MD) for the first two Bears runs before she scored on a
Mack Murnane(Wilmington, NC) single.
Unfortunately for CGA, despite 10 hits in the game, they would only score once more in the game, ultimately falling 10-4. Their fourth run came with two outs in the final inning on a
Lauren Ragonese(Liverpool, NY) single to score
Natalie Beck. Just before the Ragonese single, pinch hitter
Elyssia Reyna(San Antonio, TX) was robbed when WPIs third baseman made a leaping grab on Reyna's line drive down the third base line.
On the mound for the Bears was
Emma Behel who took the loss despite a gutsy effort. Behel threw all seven innings, only allowing two earned runs and striking out two. She also was able to stay in the game despite taking a rocket line drive comebacker to the body in the fourth inning.
Much like in game one, Coast Guard got down early to WPI in game two with the Engineers scoring twice in the top of the first. The Bears however would quickly tie the game with one run in the first and another in the second. In the first, after
Abriana Schmutz led off with an infield single, she advanced to third on two wild pitches and scored when
Bridget Bartz(Arlington, VA) did her job and hit a sacrifice fly to score her. In the second, the Bears tied the score at 2-2 with all freshmen doing the damage.
Lauren Ragonese started the rally with a single with
Madeline Kibler walking to advance Ragonese to scoring position before
Hayden Reilly(Prosper, TX) brought her in with a single past the diving WPI third baseman.
The Engineers would take back the lead in the 5th on a groundout to second to score their leadoff batter of the inning who singled and later advanced to third on an error. It was in the 6th inning however, that the game fell out of reach for the Bears. Much like game one, it was errors that buried the Bears. WPI would score three unearned runs on two errors in the 6th to take a 6-2 lead, a score that would end up as the final. Across both games of the doubleheader, CGA would allow 16 runs, only four of which were earned, with 10 errors on the day.
On the mound in game two for Coast Guard was
Dana Walker(Macon, GA). Walker went the distance, fanning six and allowing just two earned runs.
The losses drop Coast Guard to 12-15-1(6-10 NEWMAC). The Bears will be home again tomorrow with a doubleheader vs Wesleyan starting at 3:00 PM. Prior to tomorrow's game, the team's two seniors will be honored:
Natalie Beck(Billings, MT) and
Veronica Krystofik(Colchester, CT).
