ST. PAUL, Minn. — When the Saint Mary's University fastpitch softball team gave up a pair of runs with one out in the bottom of the seventh inning in falling to fifth-ranked UW-Eau Claire, 7-6, in the second game of Friday's nonconference doubleheader, Cardinal head coach
Jen Miller wasn't happy — but it was tough for her to be too disappointed.
After all, the Cardinals did win the opener, 4-2, to earn the split.
Against a nationally ranked team.
When the Cardinals surrendered a run with two out in the bottom of the seventh in dropping a 2-1, Game 2 decision to Hamline a day later, however, Miller wasn't so understanding.
"Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice … ."
"We gave away the second game, just like we did (Friday against UW-Eau Claire)," said Miller, whose team erupted for four runs in the top of the seventh inning to earn a 4-1 victory in the opener, but surrendered an unearned run in the bottom of the seventh of Game 2 in settling for the split. "We gave them an extra out (in the seventh) and they made us pay for it.
"Offensively, we didn't hit the ball quite as well as we did (against Eau Claire), but we got some timely hits when we needed them in the first game," Miller added. "It really was the same story as Friday — we were solid offensively and on the mound, but we were a little shaky in the field."
And, for the second straight day, that shakiness came back to haunt the Cardinals.
After getting two-run singles from
Nikki Jung (Inver Grove Heights, Minn.) and
Jenny Giannini (River Grove, Ill.) to win Game 1, the Cardinals spotted Hamline a 1-0, fourth-inning lead in the nightcap, before getting an RBI single from
Cassie Otte (Randolph, Minn.) in the fifth to knot the game at 1-1.
And then came the seventh.
An SMU error allowed the Pipers' leadoff runner to reach in the seventh, and, after a sacrifice bunt and a ground out to the pitcher, Jourdan Ulrich delivered an RBI bunt single to lift the PIpers to the 2-1 win.
"I was a little disappointed with the way we lost on Friday, because we were in position to take two games from a nationally ranked team," said Miller. "But (the Hamline split) hurts a lot more. We had a chance to pick up to key MIAC wins and didn't get the job done. We can't afford to be giving away (conference) wins, and that's what we did today."
