The Elon University softball team was pounded 12-2 by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga in the rubber game of the two teams’ three game set at Frost Park Stadium on April 6. It was the third straight conference series the Phoenix has lost, having also lost two out of three at Georgia Southern University on March 22 and 23, and home against Furman University on March 29 and 30.
The Phoenix jumped out to an early 1-0 lead in the top of the first. Freshman right fielder Alaina hall hit a one-out triple down the right field line and was cashed in on senior Carleigh Nester’s bloop single to right.
But Phoenix junior starter Caitlin O’Shea struggled mightily, blowing the Phoenix’s lead in the bottom of the second when left fielder Nicole Osterman launched the first pitch she saw to straightaway center to knot the game at 1-1.
In the bottom of the third, the wheels fell off for O’Shea. With runners on first and second and one out, she gave up a single to right center by Alyssa Taylor to put the Mocs ahead 2-1. After a walk to Anyssa Robles, Osterman was hit by a pitch, allowing a third run to score. It was then that O’Shea was taken out after being charged with six runs on four hits. She was saddled with her tenth loss of the season.
Freshman reliever Alli Burdette didn’t fare much better in the third, allowing two additional runs to score on a bases loaded walk to Criket Blanco and a grand slam from Jesslyn Stockard before finally getting the last two outs of the inning. By then, the Mocs led 8-1 and had seized control of the game.
Chattanooga’s offensive onslaught wasn’t finished, though. In the bottom of the fourth, the Mocs would add four more runs off junior Phoenix pitcher Chelsea White, who had come in to relieve Burdette.
Robles doubled with runners on first and second to score one, Kaiti Dutton followed two batters later with a double to score two more, and Stockard would add a fifth RBI to her career day to stretch the Mocs lead to 12-1.
The Phoenix would scratch out a run in the top of the fifth on a Mocs error, but it was all it could muster, falling 12-2 in four and a half innings.
The Phoenix will look to rebound with a nonconference weekday game against local foe North Carolina A&T State University April 9. The game is scheduled to begin at 4:30 p.m.