Box Score

WAVERLY, Iowa — New day, new opponent, new cast of heroes, same result — one and done.

The Saint Mary's University fastpitch softball team moved within one game of its second straight national tournament appearance Saturday morning, as the Cardinals beat up on top-seeded Wartburg 8-3 in a winner's bracket game of the NCAA Division III Midwest Regional.

“I thought we came out much more relaxed today and that allowed us to get into a good (offensive) groove right from the start,” said SMU coach Nikki Fennern, whose team advances to Sunday's 1 p.m. championship game. “That was the best we've swung the bats in a long time.

“It was a great win for us.”

What makes the win that much greater is the fact that, for the second straight day, the Cardinals had to only play one game. With a perfect 2-0 record, SMU was able to sit back and relax as the rest of the remaining regional field — Wartburg, St. Thomas and Marian — beat up on each other for the right to join the Cardinals in Sunday's title game. Which is exactly what Wartburg did, knocking out St. Thomas 4-0 in the final elimination game on Saturday.

“Having to only play one game a day is a huge advantage for us,” said Fennern. “Not only does it allow us the opportunity to rest and keep everyone fresh, but it also means that we enter (Sunday's) game undefeated, and whoever we face has to beat us twice.”

Talk about your mission impossible.

SMU has not been swept in a doubleheader by an NCAA Division III team since the 1996 season — long before any of the current Cardinals were even on the team.

“We're definitely in the driver's seat,” said SMU senior Jill Hocking, who belted a pair of hits in three at-bats — including a two-run home run in SMU's four-run second inning. “Winning those first two games means someone is going to have to come out and beat us twice, and that's not too easy to do. Winona State did it (winning 1-0 and 5-4 in eight innings) earlier this year, but they're a Division II school, so that's a little different.”

Speaking of a little different, for the second straight game the Cardinals' got key hits from the lower half of the batter order — not to mention from some rather unsuspecting players.

Gina Rizzardi (Woodbury, Minn.), who went 0-for-3 in the Cardinals' tournament-opening 1-0 win over St. Thomas on Friday, got the Cardinals on the board in the first inning Saturday, drilling a one-out, bases-loaded single to left, scoring Ann Munzenmaier (Urbandale, Iowa) and Jennifer Meyer (Oconomowoc, Wis.).

“We came out a lot more aggressive at the plate today,” said Rizzardi. “We were going up there looking to jump on (the Wartburg pitcher) right away. We didn't want another one-run game, and getting those two runs early helped settle everyone down a bit.”

The Cardinals then appeared to have broken the game wide open in the second, as Niki Lynch (Winona, Minn.) — the hero of Friday's win with a run-scoring double in the bottom of the seventh — led off with a single and trotted home ahead of Lindsey Smith (Elma, Iowa), whose first-pitch opposite field home run just stayed inside the right-field foul pole. Two outs later, Meyer reached on an error and scored on Hocking's two-run blast to straightaway center field as SMU's lead climbed to 6-0.

Wartburg made things interesting in the third, capitalized on a pair of SMU errors to score three runs and cut the deficit to 6-3. After going down in order in the third and the fourth, however, the Cardinals proved their third-inning defensive lapse was nothing than a brief hiccup, as they put the game out of reach in the fifth, scoring twice on Lynch's two-out, two-run double.

“Innings like that happen, but you have to put them behind you and not worry about it,” said Rizzardi. “We know we are a good defensive team and innings like that don't happen too often. We just made sure to stay focused and not let it affect us.”

It didn't.

“Obviously we pride ourselves on our defensive play,” said Fennern, whose team entered the regional tournament as the nation's top-ranked defensive team with a .973 fielding percentage. “But when you do have an inning like we did in the third inning, it's nice to know that your offense is there to bail you out.”

Unless, of course, you're the opposition.