After dropping nine of its last 10 contests, the Columbia softball team snapped out of its rut with a pair of convincing nonconference wins against Iona College on Thursday.
In the first game, the Lions jumped out of the gate early with three runs in the first inning. Center fielder Jackie Ecker hit a leadoff single and scored one out later on shortstop Keli Leong’s RBI double.
After first baseman Dani Pineda’s single, left fielder Ciji Rich slugged her fourth homer of the year, a three run shot over the fence in left field to put the Lions up 4-0.
Freshman Maggie Johnson pitched a complete game, yielding no earned runs, striking out seven batters, and walking just two in her 10th win of the year. The Gaels’ only run of the game came on Columbia second baseman Chantee Dempsey’s fielding error in the third inning.
Leong added a sacrifice fly to plate third baseman Karen Tulig in the second inning. Pineda scored a run on Johnson’s sacrifice groundout in the fifth inning, and both Leong and Pineda had an RBI in the sixth inning to give the Light Blue an 8-1 win.
In the second game, right-hander Aimee Kemp had one of her better outings this year, scattering nine hits through six innings of work for three runs to improve her record to 4-10 on the season.
After retiring the first six batters she faced, the Gaels got to Kemp for the game’s first run in the top of the third inning when Iona catcher Melanie Gettins hit an RBI single.
The Lions responded in the bottom of the third inning when Rich singled home Leong for her fourth RBI of the afternoon to tie the score at 1-1. Leong knocked in two more runs with her base hit in the fourth inning and Johnson doubled home Rich and scored on a fielding error to put the Lions up 5-1.
Iona threatened with two runs in the sixth, but right-hander Erica Clauss threw a scoreless seventh inning for the first save of her collegiate career, securing a 5-3 win.
The Lions will try to carry the momentum from their sweep Thursday as they wind down the season in their final conference games against a Penn team (22-20, 6-10 Ivy) that is third in the Ivy League South Division standings.
The Quakers come into the weekend after splitting their doubleheader against Drexel on Wednesday. Freshman pitcher Jessie Lupardus pitched seven complete innings, allowing just three earned runs while striking out eight. The southpaw has quickly emerged as the ace of her team’s pitching staff in her first collegiate season, leading the Quakers with 17 wins, 161 1/3 innings, and a 1.38 ERA in 22 starts this season.
The first two games of the four-game series will be played at 12:30 and 2:30 p.m. in the Columbia Softball Stadium on Saturday. The series shifts to Warren Field in Pennsylvania on Sunday with the contests scheduled for 12:30 and 2:30 p.m.