1	2	3	4	5	6	7				R	H	E
North Central	0	0	2	0	4	0	0				6	8	4
Saint Mary's	4	0	3	0	3	0					10	15	3

Cardinals win offensive slugfest, 10-6, over North Central to stay alive

EAU CLAIRE, Wis. — For the second straight game, the Saint Mary's University fastpitch softball team reached double figures in hits, battering four North Central pitchers for 15 hits in the teams' loser's bracket elimination game at the NCAA Division III National Championships at Gelein Field.

Only this team around, SMU made those hits count, parlaying those 15 hits into 10 runs en route to a 10-6 victory, earning Saint Mary's a spot in Saturday's 6:30 p.m. game against Wheaton, a 4-1 winner over Roanoke earlier in the day.

"Today we were able to string out hits together, and that was the difference," said SMU coach Nikki Fennern, whose team lost its first post-season game in two years on Friday, dropping a 2-0 decision to Muskingum, despite outhitting the Muskies 10-6. "Offensively, we are hitting the ball as well as we have all season, so that's a big plus for us."

Unfortunately, the Cardinals' performance against North Central also had a big minus, as SMU — which entered the tournament as the nation's top-ranked team in fielding percentage — committed a season-high three errors.

"We know we have to clean up our defense a bit," admitted Fennern. "We had some mental lapses in the field, and when you get to this level, when you're playing for a national championship, you can't afford to have any lapses."

The SMU offense certainly didn't have any lapses, erupting for four first-inning runs, then adding three in the third and three more in the fifth to ice the win.

"We've been hitting the ball hard all tournament, today we just continued that," said SMU sophomore Jackie Huegel, who led SMU's offensive onslaught, going 4-for-4 — including a two-run first-inning home run and an RBI double — while also scoring three times. "I don't think there was any extra pressure on us — we just wanted to go out there and play the way we are capable of playing.

"Everyone on this team is confident we can come through (the loser's bracket) and still win this," continued Huegel, who was SMU's starting shortstop on last year's national championship team. "This was the first step."

Huegel and Jill Hocking, who finished the game 3-for-4 had the big blows in Saint Mary's four-run first as Hocking delivered a two-run double and, one out later, Huegel laced a line drive over the left-field fence to score two more.

North Central, which finishes the season with a 45-11 overall record, got two runs back in the third on Teri Hanson's two-run, two-out double, but SMU responded with three runs in the bottom of the third — getting an RBI double from Huegel and RBI ground outs from Gina Rizzardi and Annie Hovde — to push the lead to 7-2.

Down, but far from out, North Central once again cut into SMU's cushion, this time turning a five-run blowout into a one-run nailbiter with four runs in the fifth. Back-to-back errors, the first a throwing error and the second a fielding error, put runners on first and second, and a single by Amanda Talley loaded the bases with no out. Teri Hanson laced North Central's second single of the day to score one run and, two outs later, Lynelle Benson hammered a double to right-center, but was thrown out trying to stretch it into a triple, ending the North Central threat.

The one-run lasted lasted all of about 10 minutes, however, as Hovde ripped an RBI double to highlight SMU's game-clinching three-run fifth inning.

"North Central kept battling," said Fennern. "They didn't make things easy for us, that's for sure."