BOSTON – The third-seeded Suffolk softball team suffered its first GNAC Tournament setback at the hands of the field's top seed, Johnson & Wales, 6-0, at Simmon's Daly Field Saturday night.
THE BASICS
SCORE: Suffolk 6, Johnson & Wales 0
RECORDS: Suffolk (27-16) | Johnson & Wales (33-7)
HOW IT HAPPENED
JWU punched open the score in the second stanza. The Wildcats ran around two base runners, who each singled and advanced on a wild pitch, with an error by Rams' leftfielder Sydney Littlefield to put Suffolk in a 2-0 hole.
The Wildcats lead lengthened an inning later. With runners on first and second, thanks to a lead-off single and walk, Diana Amendolara tripled to bring the pair in. The leftfielder came home thanks to Tiffani Semanchik's double to give JWU a 5-0 advantage.
Suffolk found itself in a six-run hole as JWU brought another one in the top of the fifth. The Rams had to play catch-up, but could not take advantage of a handful of base runners, with JWU holding the blue-and-gold down the stretch to lock up its ticket to the championship game.
STATISTICALLY SPEAKING
- Devlin Frost and Ashley Zulla each went 2-for-4 on the day.
- Littlefield and Jaclyn Flint produced one hit apiece for the Rams.
PITCHERS PICTURE
- Taylor Holmes fell in the circle, allowing five runs (three earned) on five hits and one walk with three Ks through 3.0 frames.
- Ali Yamakaitis tossed the final four frames, giving up just one run on two hits and sat down three batters.
- Jennifer Corona earned the victory with a complete-game shutout. She limited the Rams to seven hits, with four walks and five strikeouts on her stat line.
COMING UP
Suffolk heads into Sunday where it will play the winner of #2 St. Joseph's (Maine)/#4 Albertus Magnus at 10 a.m.