Things didn’t start or end well for the Terrapin softball team during its weekend series at No. 22 North Carolina.
The Terps lost all three games to the Tar Heels (27-6-1, 5-1 ACC) and fell to 22-7 on the season. The Terps entered the weekend as the only team in the ACC that had not played a conference game, and the 0-3 start was certainly not what it wanted.
“We have to let it go. It’s not the end of the season – we’re just beginning the conference season,” coach Laura Watten said. “We’ve got to continue to focus on the positives and the success level that was already reached. We can’t look back; we gotta keep looking forward. I’m not concerned with the losses because the conference is pretty even, and North Carolina is actually the toughest team in the conference. We started out with the best team.”
The Tar Heels jumped on the Terps early in their game Friday, as Cassie Palmer hit a leadoff home run off junior pitcher Sarah Dooley (9-6) to give North Carolina a 1-0 lead before an out had been recorded. Palmer extended the lead in the second inning when she singled home Dani Manko from second; Manko was pinch running for Alyssa Francona.
Dooley settled down and allowed only one hit after the second frame, but it wasn’t enough, as the Terps could only muster a single run the entire game.
Their best chance came in the sixth inning when, down by two, senior first baseman Sarde Stewart singled home junior second baseman Breanna Shaw to make the score 2-1. But with two on and no outs, Tar Heel pitcher Danielle Spaulding (8-1) struck out senior catcher Brittany Bessho, induced junior third baseman Devon Williams into a fielder’s choice and struck out sophomore shortstop Alex Schultz to end the threat.
The Terps had one more shot in the seventh inning, but Spaulding retired the side to end the game and preserve the 2-1 victory for the Tar Heels.
It didn’t get better for the Terps on Saturday, as they dropped two more, 5-1 and 3-2.
Junior pitcher Meredith Nelles (9-1) and Dooley both took losses on the day. In the first game, Nelles allowed four runs in 3 and 2/3 innings before freshman Kerry Hickey came in for relief. Like the day before, Terp hitters provided a single run in support: a Stewart home run which came in the fourth inning, her team-leading fourth of the season.
The Terps struck first in the second game Saturday when Stewart singled and senior outfielder Jenny Belak scored on an error. They would score again in the fourth inning to take a 2-1 advantage, but they would also strand three runners on base, which came back to haunt them in the sixth when North Carolina scored two. The Tar Heels held on to win the game 3-2 and sweep the weekend series 3-0.
The only Terps to record RBIs during the weekend were Stewart, who drove in two, and Belak, who drove in one and also collected five hits Saturday, driving her batting average up to a team-high .385. Belak has hit .538 during the last seven games and also scored a run Saturday to move into fifth place on the school’s all-time career list with 99.
“I know that, physically and skill-wise, we have it,” Stewart said. “We can do it. We do it in practice. I just think there’s a lack of focus in the box and in game situations.”
The Terps seemed to be a far cry from the team that earlier in the season won a program-record 16 games straight. Albeit against lesser competition, the Terps displayed extraordinary pitching and clutch offense and always seemed to make the right play.
Still, Watten was not happy with the inconsistent play of her team during the streak, citing the need to so often come through with late-inning hits to win games as something that needed rectifying. Watten’s fears have come to fruition, as offensive inconsistency has led to a 3-6 mark during the last nine games.
“I told them that we gotta regroup and get focused on what and who we are and really establish that from here on out,” Watten said. “We know what we can do and what our level of play is. I was just trying to keep their heads up because they were all games we absolutely could have won. It’s the first conference game, so it’s not the end of the world. We’ve got a lot of teams to play, and we’ve already earned a lot of respect.”
“I feel like we were waiting for something to happen instead of attacking and making it happen,” Stewart said. “We expect it of each other since that’s what we’ve been doing instead of taking the initiative individually. … Everybody has a job to do, and I feel like, if everyone did their job, we’d be successful every game. It takes the entire team to win.”
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