THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. - For the final time of the season, facing Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) leading La Verne, the Cal Lutheran softball team honored five seniors despite a pair of tough inning-shortened losses, 8-0 and 13-4, to the Leopards today.
A pair of four-year letter winners in Taylor Beacham and Blake Lewis, two-year team members Andrea Brackpool and Hannah Brown and first-year Regals outfielder Brittany Reed were all honored prior to first pitch and with an extended ceremony following the games.
An early two-out rally by the Leopards was too much for the Regals to come back from after the first frame. La Verne used four hits including an RBI double from Raeleen Tellez to score three first inning runs, but a great relay from Brackpool to Mikaela Mayhew to Beacham cut down Sienna Kendricks at the plate to end the frame. Kendricks led off the top of the fourth with a solo shot to push the lead to 4-0 and in the top of the fifth, LV plated four more including a three run homerun by Mackenzie Dutton.
Senior Katherine Kibbe (15-4) had a perfect game through four and a third until Brackpool broke it up with a single up the middle to center. She finished the shutout with six strikeouts.
Game two was déjà vu as the Leopards put up three in the first, but the Cal Lutheran bats woke up.
CLU got things going offensively in the bottom of the inning after Brown drew a leadoff walk and Antonia Rapisardi layed down a perfect bunt that was not fielded by the defense, allowing Brown to get to third. Amanda Lewis drove a double into the right-centerfield gap, driving in the first CLU run of the day. B. Lewis followed suit with a sacrifice fly, cutting the deficit to one at 3-2.
After two scoreless innings, B. Lewis and Brackpool drew back-to-back walks, forcing starting pitcher Hayley Jaquess from the circle as Kibbe took back over the pitching duties and CLU was unable to add to its tally.
La Verne looked to Dutton for another long ball, a three-run no-doubt-about-it round tripper to left, doubling the Leopards runs to six for a 6-2 lead midway through the fourth.
The Regals also doubled their total in the bottom of the fourth on a pair of LV errors coupled with a leadoff double by Beacham and a bunt single from Brown. With the bases loaded, CLU threatened for more, but a strikeout and a diving play at shortstop by La Verne ended the inning with the Violet and Gold down by two, 6-4.
Again, the Leopards responded, sending 10 batters to the box in the top of the fifth inning, scoring seven, four alone on a grand slam homerun by Kibbe in an inning that LV collected six hits.
Trailing by nine, CLU was unable to make any more noise as the game came to a close with the Regals on the short end of a 13-4 loss.
Mayhew paced the offense in game two with two of the seven hits, going 2-for-2 with a run scored. The remaining hits came from five different players, Beacham, Brackpool, Brown, A. Lewis and Rapisardi while B. Lewis walked twice and A. Lewis drove in a pair.
Nicole White-Madolora (3-8) was tagged with the loss. She threw a complete game, striking out one.
Cal Lutheran (15-22, 9-17 SCIAC) has wrapped up the home portion of its schedule and will conclude conference play tomorrow, Saturday, April 30, on the road at Redlands with first pitch of the double dip scheduled for 12:00 p.m.
Box Score: LV 8, CLU 0 (5 innings)
Box Score: LV 13, CLU 4 (5innings)
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