BEAUMONT, Texas – The Texas A&M-Corpus Christi softball team could not walk out of its doubleheader against Lamar with a victory on Saturday afternoon, first getting taken down 8-0 in the opener before then conceding late and falling in a heartbreaker in the second contest by a final score of 8-7.
Game 1 // Lamar 8, A&M-Corpus Christi 0 (F/5)
The Islanders quickly found themselves in a tough spot to start the day, as after the two teams traded 1-2-3 innings in the first, Lamar put together a six-run rally with two outs in the bottom half of the second to take a commanding early lead. The Cardinals would then push this advantage even further, plating two more on a home run in the fourth to put the game within run-rule territory.
Needing to rally at the plate to force the game to continue, A&M-Corpus Christi was unable to heat up with the bats, notching just a lone hit in the second inning on a one-out single by
Eva Gallegos. The team could not capitalize on this traffic, though, going down in order to end the frame and failing to get anymore on base until the game hit its early conclusion.
Game 2 // Lamar 8, A&M-Corpus Christi 7
Once they hit the field for the second time, the Islanders had no such troubles offensively, jumping right out of the gates by hanging five runs on the Cardinals in the opening frame. All of this scoring came with two outs, a rally that started when
Skylar Heger tripled home
Jada Zepeda after she had reached on an error earlier in the inning and continued with Gallegos bringing in Heger with a double right down the right field line immediately after.
Karisa Lopez then followed this up with a base hit of her own to plate a pair, and after advancing to third on two wild pitches, she capped off the inning by swiping home as part of a successful double steal.
A&M-Corpus Christi did not let up after this either, bringing in two more in the second inning again with two outs to bring its advantage up to seven. Unlike the frame before, both of these were plated on one singular play, as after
Zoey Stewart and Zepeda reached on a fielder's choice and a walk and then advanced into scoring position on a wild pitch, they both managed to come home on a costly error from Lamar's second baseman.
Facing a nearly identical deficit to what they had the Islanders in earlier, the Cardinals started to chip away, first starting with a four spot in the bottom half of the same inning to pull back within striking distance. A&M-Corpus Christi stemmed this tide with a pair of shutdown frames in the third and fourth, but in the later stages of the game, Lamar struck once again, scoring two in both the fifth and sixth to take its first lead of the day.
With one last chance to pull back ahead, the Islanders threatened in the top of the seventh, loading the bases on back-to-back walks from
Taylor Reyes and
Kayla Santiago and a fielder's choice off the bat of Stewart in which everyone was safe. This brought the tying run 90 feet away and the go-ahead run into scoring position, but they could not get the big hit they needed, striking out to bring the ballgame to a tough end.
The second game saw eight of the 10 A&M-Corpus Christi players to record an official at-bat get on base in some fashion, a group that was led by Lopez, who went 2-4 with two RBIs and a run scored. The rest of the knocks were tallied by Zepeda, Heger, Gallegos,
Mimi Thornton and
Brooke Jones, while Reyes and
Erynne Castillo also reached safely on free passes.
The Islanders will now try to salvage the series in the finale on Saturday, returning back to action for first pitch at 12 p.m.
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