The Maryland softball team knew it had been eliminated from the Big Ten Tournament contention before starting its final series of the season against Indiana.
Coach Julie Wright’s squad needed to sweep the Hoosiers and have Ohio State win three games over Michigan State in order to qualify. While the Terps’ game Friday was postponed due to rain, the Spartans beat the Buckeyes, 6-0, to clinch the competition’s final seed.
That meant the weekend series for senior infielders Corey Schwartz and Lindsey Schmeiser would be their last in a Maryland uniform. The team wanted to finish the season strong for them.
After the Terps were demolished by a combined score of 20-4 during Saturday’s doubleheader with Indiana, an offensive burst for a 10-8 win Sunday gave the seniors a memorable final outing.
“It means a lot, especially because we’ve struggled this season,” said Schmeiser, who finished her career as the program’s all-time leader in home runs and runs scored. “It was a little emotional … but it’s still a little surreal. You kind of don’t believe it’s happening. It’ll hit me tomorrow.”
The Sunday effort also provided momentum entering the offseason, as starters expected to return to the team next year contributed to the winning performance.
“To do it on your home field for Senior Day is great,” Wright said. “We’ll be able to carry that forward with this victory vaulting us into the summer and fall.”
However, Maryland’s struggles in the first two games of the series showed the team’s room for improvement. With the 8-3 and 12-1 defeats, the Terps’ streak of scoring four runs or fewer extended to 12 games. And their overall losing skid stretched to 13 contests.
In Game 2, which Maryland lost via the run rule, the pitching rotation continued its slump.
The Hoosiers tagged starting pitcher Hannah Dewey for nine runs (five earned) while relief pitchers Ari Jarvis and Brenna Nation gave up three more runs in the loss. The Terps ended the season with the worst team ERA in the Big Ten.
So Wright said that while she was pleased with the Sunday result, she wasn’t satisfied with the season as a whole.
Nonetheless, the Terps’ 10-8 Sunday triumph provided hope for the future.
While Schwartz and Schmeiser bid an emotional farewell to the program — Maryland honored them throughout the contest by painting their numbers on the outfield grass, posting their pictures around Maryland Softball Stadium and giving them flowers — it was an underclassman who powered the win.
Infielder Skylynne Ellazar, a sophomore first-year starter at third base, who finished with a team-leading .399 batting average, went 3-for-3 with five RBIs.
With the score tied at six in the fifth frame, she stepped up to the plate with the bases loaded and two outs. On a full count, she belted a go-ahead grand slam off the scoreboard in center field. After the game, she said the blast was the first grand slam she had ever hit.
Instead of basking in the game-winning knock, though, Ellazar emphasized that Sunday was about honoring the seniors. The home run, she said, was for Schwartz and Schmeiser.
“They’ve been such a big part of my freshman and sophomore year in my development, and they’re such good leaders for me,” she said. “I just wanted to give back to them for their senior game.”
Ellazar hopes the win puts the Terps’ rough campaign behind them as they look to regroup entering the offseason.
“We came into this game and I said to the captains that we wanted to leave a mark to say that this is how next year is going to be,” she said. “We just wanted a spark for next year, and we ended up on a good note for our seniors sending them off well.”
