LANCASTER, Pa. - The Haverford College softball team (8-24, 2-12 CC), dropped a pair of Centennial Conference games to Franklin & Marshall (13-9, 5-7 CC) Saturday on the Baker Campus Field on the campus of Franklin & Marshall College.
Franklin & Marshall 8, Haverford 0 (five innings)
Grace Stowe paced the Fords in hits in game one with two, while Lauren Martin and Maddie Etheridge each added a knock each. The Diplomats got off to a hot start in the bottom of the first inning, as a Sophia Noriega RBI-single and a Madison Martin two-run double off Alexa Finkele, put F&M up 3-0 quickly.
After Charlotte Dwyer quieted the Fords in the second and third innings, a pair of runs in the bottom of third and fourth, increased the Franklin & Marshall lead to 7-0, headed into the top of the fifth. A Natalie Garza RBI single ended the game early for the Diplomats, as Franklin & Marshall picked up an 8-0 victory via the eight-run rule.
Dwyer was credited with the complete-game shutout for the hosts, striking out two.
Franklin & Marshall 10, Haverford 6
Game two saw Mia Kessinger lead the offensive effort for the Fords, going 3-for-4 with a solo home run, while Jocelyn Leal went 2-for-4 with two runs batted in of the course of the offensive battle.
Haverford opened up the scoring in game number two in the first inning, after Leal got on the base paths via an infield error by the Diplomats, advancing Maddie Etheridge to second base. With Leal on first and Etheridge on second, Abby Litchfield launched a two-run double to right field, to give the Scarlet and Black an early 2-0 lead.
However, the Diplomats got the bats going once again in game two. After an Alexa Klepper triple, Maddy Yeingst plated Klepper home on an RBI single, to trim the Haverford lead down to 2-1.
Sophia Noriega then singled, advancing Yeingst to second base, before a Madison Martin two-run triple gave the Diplomats a 3–2 lead. Martin eventually crossed the plate off a Megan Wiarda single, as F&M carried a 4-2 lead into the top of the second. Franklin and Marshall continued to tack on the runs in the bottom of the second, as three more runs pushed the host's lead 7-2 after two frames. The three-run inning was highlighted by a Martin RBI double.
A Kessinger blast to left field in the third inning trimmed the hosts' lead down to 7-3, before a Nora Sidorski RBI groundout extended the Diplomats lead to 8-3. The top of the fifth saw the Fords' fourth run of the day with an RBI groundout from Leal, before back-to-back solo homers from Wiarda and Hannah Matusiak, gave Franklin & Marshall a 10-4 advantage.
A pair of RBI singles from Kessinger and Leal in the seventh inning, cut the F&M lead down to 10-6, but it was too little, too late for Haverford, as Franklin & Marshall came away with the 10-6 victory.
Softball will now close out the regular season in Collegeville, Pa., on Tuesday, April 23, as the Fords will challenge the Bears of Ursinus in a Centennial Conference doubleheader. First pitch of game one is slated for 3 p.m.