Eureka Outscores Opponents 26-0 on Day 2
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. – The Eureka softball team improved to 5-0 on the season without giving up a run in a doubleheader sweep at the Fastpitch Dreams Spring Classic on Monday.
First, the Red Devils pounded Holy Family 21-0 in five quick innings. Then, the team managed to hold off Lycoming in a 5-0 victory to end the day.
It's Eureka softball's first 5-0 start since 2016.
GAME 1: Eureka 21, Holy Family 0 (5 inn.)
In the first game of the day, the Red Devils racked up 21 runs on 21 hits while taking advantage of seven Holy Family errors and drawing five walks.
The 21-run margin of victory was the Red Devils' largest since shutting out Principia in St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference play on April 1, 2017.
The team notched seven runs off eight hits and three errors in the first inning and scored at least more in every inning after.
Thirteen Red Devils recorded at least one hit.
Sidney Wightman (Waterloo, Ill./Gibault Catholic) went 3-for-4 with a double and three RBIs at the plate and collected the win in the circle. The sophomore conceded zero runs on seven hits and zero walks, and chalked up seven strikeouts along the way.
Gabby Wood (Bartonville, Ill./Limestone) went 3-for-3 with 2 RBIs, while Raelyn Payne (Lexington, Ill./Lexington), Sydney Shubert (Canton, Ill./Canton), Morgan Ledbetter (Hanna City, Ill./Elmwood), and Allison Cagley (Fairbury, Ill./Prairie Central) had two hits apiece.
Payne and Erin Smith (Dunlap, Ill./Dunlap) each had doubles, as well.
GAME 2: Eureka 5, Lycoming 0
After allowing just one on three hits in a win over Penn St.-Schuykill on Sunday, Smith notched her first shutout of the season on Monday. The Red Devils' senior ace allowed seven hits, conceded zero walks and had three strikeouts.
At the plate, the Red Devils scattered seven hits, with Shubert and Adrianna Zeman (La Salle, Ill./La Salle-Peru) contributing two apiece.
After each team left a runner on in the first inning, Eureka knocked four hits and scored three runs in the second.
Zeman and Faith Bachtold (Fairbury, Ill./Prairie Central) set the table with a pair of singles, then Smith and her battery mate Aubrey Sanders sent them home with back-to-back doubles.
Smith helped manufacture another EC run in the fourth when her RBI groundout allowed Zeman to score after she singled with one out.
The Red Devils scored once more in the sixth after Wood reached on a field error that allowed Zeman to score.
Lycoming got runners aboard in every inning except for the last. But the Red Devils held the line and never let a run score.
They've now outscored opponents 42-4 in the tournament.
UP NEXT:
Eureka only has one game on Tuesday – an 8:30 a.m. challenge against Rhode Island College.