Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Martin Luther University freshman Rachel McCona throws the ball home during the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference softball game against Northwestern University on Friday at MLC.
NEW ULM — Friday night's game against Northwestern would have been much more interesting for Martin Luther University heading into the bottom of the seventh inning if they had canceled out the top of the third inning.
The Knights had a chance to do some damage control with their bats starting in the top of the third inning, but the Eagles' six runs in the third inning gave them a 10-3 victory in an Upper Midwest Athletic Conference softball game. could not do that. Match at MLC.
Chloe Berg led the Knights with 3-for-3 hits and two RBIs, while Jordyn Heckendorf went 3-for-3 with a triple and two RBIs.
Kate Beal led the Eagles with a 3-for-3 hit, one RBI, and two walks, and Grace Bentley was 3-for-5, two RBI, and one home run. Gabriel Keith also had a double for the Eagles, going 2-for-5 with one RBI.
Emma Heffron pitched seven innings, allowing three earned runs on seven hits and two walks, earning the win. She had eight strikeouts.
Jessica Horn pitched a complete game, allowing 16 hits and four walks, giving up eight earned runs and one strikeout.
Other than the third inning, when Horn allowed eight hits and a wild pitch, the junior right-hander was calm after that.
“We watch hitters beforehand, we watch footage of other teams, and we know which hitters to watch out for and what we’re trying to protect.” MLC head softball coach Becca Doering said. “I want to thank Jess. Jess has put in so much effort as a junior who didn't pitch in high school and has really pushed to do what we can do. She's a fighter and She didn't want to come out that inning and I give her a lot of credit.
“She was dealing with a very tough zone with the umpires, but I thought she adjusted well. And I thought she mentally worked through it and came back and had a few solid innings.” I'm really happy about that.'' Being a pitcher is hard in itself. Everything starts with her self, so we must be able to pick her up too. And when she's having such a tough innings, when we get her opportunity, we definitely have to pick her up. ”
Doering said he thought the strike zone on the wing was a little tight, but added that the calls were consistent and players needed to adapt.
“I've been a referee in the past, and I have a lot of respect for referees, especially at the college level, because it's not an easy job.” Doering said. “He worked very consistently so I appreciated that. But you know it's difficult, but we have to be able to adapt to it at the end of the day. yeah.”
The Eagles started the game with a 1-0 lead on Jadyn Iverson's RBI home run, but in the bottom of the first inning, Anna Busch hit a double and Heckendorf homered to tie the game. We lost that lead. MLC then took a 2-1 lead with Berg's RBI homer to bring Busch home.
Sidney Lane's RBI single led to a double by Riley Summers, tying the score at 2.
Then, in the bottom of the third inning, a big six-run run came to break things up for the Eagles.
Bentley took the lead with a home run to left field. UNW strung together four more hits before Horn forced an infield hit to Berg for the first out.
However, the Eagles added one more run before that out, and then scored three more on a hit and a ground out. After batting in the lineup, Bentley stepped up to the plate again and stopped the scoring with an RBI single to right field in the third inning, giving the Eagles an 8–2 lead.
In the bottom of the third inning, Berg singled to right, driving in Heckendorf and putting the Knights down 8-3.
After several scoreless frames, Heckendorf stayed put in the top of the sixth inning when he made a highlight catch in center field and saved a hit. On this play, Lane grabbed the ball and sent it deep to center field, but Heckendorf backpedaled fast enough to make a jumping grab while retreating to the fence, forcing his team to retreat.
The Eagles added two more runs in the seventh inning after Beal scored on an error and Keith scored on a double by Legan Henning.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, Emmalee Mindock walked and with one out, Heckendorf singled to center field, but the Knights stranded both runners with a popout and a ground ball to end the game.
Doering said he was happy to have the opportunity to play for UNW so early in the season as opposed to last season. The Knights ended last year's season with two losses in a doubleheader against UNW in St. Paul.
“Northwestern has always been a solid team.” Doering said. “They have deep pitching, they have strong hitters, their coaches [Alicia du’Monceaux] We're always so excited to play against them because they're a really solid team because she knows her stuff and has been doing this for a very long time. So we knew they were going to be solid and we knew we had to play a clean game, but we didn't do that enough and that's why we ended up like that. ”
The Knights (2-14, 0-2) have a chance to defeat the Eagles (10-7, 4-0) in Saturday's doubleheader, with the first game starting at 11 a.m. at MLC.
