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Game 2 Box Score /
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WINONA, Minn. — Alphabetically,
Amy Zimniewicz (River Falls, Wis.) always finds her self at the end of the Saint Mary's University fastpitch softball team's roster.
And in the batting order, the Cardinal freshmen holds down the No. 8 spot in the nine-person lineup.
Saturday afternoon, however, Zimniewicz was the beginning of a crucial Cardinal rally.
Make that two Cardinal rallies.
Zimniewicz belted a run-scoring double to ignite a four-run SMU second, then followed that up with a two-run double to jump-start the Cardinals' seven-run fifth, as Saint Mary's rallied from a 7-0, second-inning deficit to beat St. Catherine 11-8 in the first game of the teams' Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference doubleheader at Cotter Field.
The Cardinals were in a come-from-behind mode in Game 2 as well, erasing Wildcat leads of 1-0 and 3-2 to complete the sweep with a 5-3 victory in the nightcap.
"It wasn't all that pretty, but we did what we had to do to get two wins," said SMU coach
Jen Miller, whose team improved to 10-2 in the MIAC and maintained its stranglehold on the No. 2 spot in the conference standings. "It was good to see us bounce back from that rough first two innings the way we did. It could have been easy for everyone just to give up, but they didn't do that — they hung in there and just battled back.
"We were a little flat in that first game, that's for sure."
A little flat?
Before the Cardinals could record the sixth out of the game, St. Catherine had erupted for three runs in the first inning — all come on Jesse McGehee's three-run home run — then tagged SMU starter
Sarah Fitzgerald (Colo, Iowa) for four more runs in the second to take what appeared to be a commanding 7-0 advantage.
Then came the bottom of the second — and the first of Zimniewicz's two rally-starting doubles.
After Zimniewicz's RBI double,
Kellie Simons (Richfield, Minn.) delivered a two-run triple, then scored on a wild pitch to close the gap to 7-4. SMU then took the lead for good, as Zimniewicz again kicked things off with a double — this one scoring
Danielle Geske (Rosemount, Minn.) and
Mallory Betzold (Farmington, Minn.). A fielder's choice and a pair of Wildcat errors — both on the same play — accounted for four more runs, as the Cardinals took the lead for good, 11-7.
The Wildcats got on the board first again in Game 2, scoring once in the top of the third, only to have the Cardinals answer with two runs in their half of the inning, getting RBI singles from
Katy Gannon (Roselle, Ill.) and Betzold.
St. Catherine regained the upper hand with a two-run fifth inning, but again the Cardinals had the answer, scoring two runs of their own in the bottom of the fifth on a sacrifice fly and a wild pitch.
"I was a little worried after the first two innings of the first game — that was definitely not something I was expecting," said Miller, who got a 4-for-4, two-run Game 2 performance from Gannon, while
Cassie Otte (Randolph, Minn.) went 1-for-4 in Game 1 and 2-for-3 in Game 2 to extend her hitting streak to 25 straight games, dating back to a season-opening, 0-for-3 showing in Game 1 against UW-Eau Claire. "But the end result is exactly what we needed. We didn't play as well today as we did Thursday (in 5-1 and 9-4 victories over Augsburg), but we were able to find a way to get the two wins."
