WINONA, Minn. — It wasn't quite the home-opener that the Saint Mary's University fastpitch softball team had envisioned.
 
UW-La Crosse — not Mother Nature — that rained on the Cardinals' first two home contests of the 2023 season Sunday afternoon, as the Eagles blanked SMU 7-0 in the opening game of their nonconference doubleheader, before belting three home runs in a 9-6 victory in the nightcap at the SMU Field.
 
GAME ONE: OFFENSE SILENCED
The Cardinals spotted UW-La Crosse an early 2-0 lead in the opener, as the Eagles tagged SMU starter Naleya Bork (De Pere, Wis.) for two runs on four hits in their first at-bat.
 
UW-L pushed its lead to 3-0 with a solo run in the third and added two more in the sixth on a two-run home run by Madi O'Brien.
 
Saint Mary's had its best offensive opportunity in the fifth and sixth innings. SMU got back-to-back one-out singles from Peyton Berg (Chatfield, Minn.) and Alexis Blackburn (Chicago, Ill.), but the Cardinals could not scratch across a run in the fifth, and had runners on second and third in the sixth — thanks to a two-out Zoe Fink (Stevens Point, Wis.) double — but again came up empty.
 
Berg finished 2-for-3 to lead the way for the Cardinals, who also got hits from Fink, Blackburn, Allison Ciero (Glen Ellyn, Ill.), and Heather Nordlund (Byron, Minn.) in the Game 1 loss.
 
GAME TWO: SIX RUNS NOT ENOUGH
For the second game in a row, the Eagles jumped out to a lead in their first at-bat, getting a pair of towering, two-run home runs off the bats of Jordyn McCormack and Marissa Pease to grab a commanding 4-0 advantage.
 
This time, however, the Cardinals had an answer, getting a two-out, RBI single by Cassie Sutor (Chicago, Ill.) in the bottom of the first to cut the deficit to three, 4-1.
 
UW-La Crosse pushed across a solo run in the top of the second, only to have the Cardinals rattle off the next five runs — parlaying two hits and an Eagle error into a run in the second, before getting an RBI single from Sutor and a two-run double by Berg as part of a four-run third — to take their first lead of the game, 6-5.
 
The lead did not last long, however, as UW-L pulled even with a single run in the fifth, before regaining the lead, 9-6, on a Pease's second home run of the game — a two-out, three-run blast to left-center to seal the Eagles' sweep-clinching victory.
 
Bork finished 3-for-4 with a pair of runs scored to pace the Cardinal offensive attack in the nightcap, while Berg, Sutor, and Riley Hall (Dallas Center, Iowa) all chipped in two hits. Berg and Sutor both delivered a pair of RBIs.
 
The Cardinals (6-8 overall) are back in action, and back on the field home, on Thursday, as they host Viterbo in a 3 p.m. nonconference doubleheader at the SMU Field.
 
 
 
 
 
 
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