Emporia State of Kansas came to South Texas and opened its season with a doubleheader sweep of Incarnate Word. And both games had oddities.
The agreement was for uiw (6-3) to host Emporia State for two softball games of seven innings each. Not one word about playing the usual 14 innings as one game and then moving on to the nightcap.
But that is what almost happened Thursday as the Hornets (2-0) edged the Cardinals 4-3 in 13 innings. Then the Hornets, determined not to repeat that performance, sent eight across in the second inning on the way to a five-frame, 10-1, run-rule win.
That game one might still be going because UIW, down 4-2, scored on in the bottom of the 13th and had a runner at third with only one away before Lauren Sharp of ESU tightened the screws to get a ground ball out and a game-ending fly ball to center. The game time was three hours, 59 minutes.
Throughout the 13 long innings of play Incarnate Word's Briana Sanchez toiled away in the circle, working all 13 frames and sending her personal lifetime high 334 pitches to the plate. When asked after the game Sanchez said this was her high as “I don't often get to even100 pitches in a game”. To add to the pain, 115 of her pitches ended up as foul balls.
This was Sanchez' (4-1) first loss of the year. She allowed the four runs, three earned, on 18 hits while walking four and fanning a season high 16.
Incarnate Word had another hero in the game. Down 2-1 in the bottom of the 10th, with one out, junior left fielder Sarah O'Brien hit one into the night behind the left field fence to dramatically tie the game.
Earlier UIW had scratched out a run in the fourth only to see Emporia State come right back in the fifth for a tying score.
That set up the 10th when both teams tallied markers. In the top of the 13th, the Hornets got the twosome. The first came on another infield error, a stolen base, an advance on the throw to second and a bunt single. The other run was on a strikeout and wild pitch.
In the second game ESU plated one in the first before getting the octet in the second on four hits and four UIW miscues. The big blow was Kaitlin Martin's two-run blast straightaway over the center field wall. The 10th and final Hornets run came on a home run by Tricia Vogel.
GAME ONE
ESU 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 -- 4 18 1
UIW 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 -- 3 10 4
GAME TWO
ESU 1 8 0 0 1 -- 10 8 0
UIW 0 0 1 0 0 -- 1 2 5
RECORDS
ESU 2-0
UIW 6-3
