BIDDEFORD — The University of New England softball team split a doubleheader with Eastern Nazarene on Tuesday afternoon at Dubois Field.
But after the second game of the contest ”“ which the Nor’easters won ”“ the team acted more like it had lost both games.
“The first game, we just didn’t come to play,” UNE catcher Ashley Gott said. “A lot of people knew that from the beginning, and we couldn’t pull it out by the end of it. We shouldn’t have lost that first game.”
The Nor’easters lost the first contest 3-0, and won the second game 9-1.
UNE is 10-6 on the regular season and is 4-2 in Commonwealth Coast Conference play.
It’s not that the Nor’easters are struggling, but as they put it, playing at the level of their opponents. The Lions entered the contest 6-16.
“We need to be up for every team that we play,” said Gott, who led UNE with a 4 for 7 day at the plate between both games. “We’ve struggled with that. It’s something we need to work on, as a team, to play at our level the entire time, and not deviate for other teams.”
In Game 1, UNE succumbed to freshman Kori Sorenson’s strong pitching performance. She hurled a four-hit shutout in eight innings of work, striking out 10 batters.
“Kori Sorenson was fantastic,” Eastern Nazarene head coach Leah Hampton said. “She’s very talented, and she’s just a freshman. She’s going to do a lot of good things for this program.”
Gott collected two of the four hits for the Nor’easters in the first game, while Jessica Potter and Gabrielle LaRoche picked up hits.
UNE’s Julie Bigelow threw seven scoreless innings, including six hitless innings, striking out two batters. The Lions, however, struck in the eighth inning when they scored three runs on an RBI single from Sorenson and a two-run single from Carissa Cicolini, seal the extra-innings win.
All nine runs that were scored by the Nor’easters in the second game came in the third inning. Sorenson started the second contest on the mound, but was pulled in favor of Cicolini, who allowed four runs on one hit and failed to register an out. UNE shortstop Amanda Vaudreuil’s two-run single highlighted the inning. In the third inning, the Nor’easters scored nine runs on five hits, while Eastern Nazarene made four errors.
“We’re very young and you can see that in the one inning where things fell apart,” Hampton said. “It was one bad inning for us, one good inning for them. That’s what happens.”
Erin Lyons picked up the win on the mound for UNE, allowing a run on six hits in five innings of work, striking out four batters.
Aside from Gott’s offensive performance, LaRoche was 3 for 4 on the day with two RBIs.
The Lions players said they noticed the Nor’easters’ performance.
“They always do well,” Hampton said. “And I love (UNE head coach Dan Letellier) he does a good job with those girls. I really respect them a lot.”
UNE travels Friday to Milton, Mass. for a double-header against Curry College.
— Contact Dave Dyer at 282-1535, Ext. 323.
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