Lady Jackets Fall to Prolific Opponent

The Lady Jackets (29-19) fell Tuesday in their final regular season home game, as the University of Indianapolis Greyhounds (45-7) defeated Cedarville 8-0. Though the game was called in six innings due to the mercy rule, head coach Wes Rowe said the score does not necessarily reflect how his team played.

“We didn’t do anything to give the game away,” Rowe said. “They just outhit us and hit at the opportune times when they had runners on base, so the score looks worse than the game was.”

Cedarville was able to keep up with Indianapolis for the first three innings. After three innings, the Greyhounds were up 1-0, though the Lady Jackets had outhit them 3-1 at that point. Then came what proved to be the crucial fourth inning.

The first batter Indianapolis sent to the plate in the fourth inning tripled to right center before the next batter up knocked away a homer straight down the left field line. After that, Cedarville pitcher Cecelia DeBartolo (14-9) gave up another triple. The Greyhounds brought in a third run in the inning off of a sacrifice bunt. DeBartolo gave up a fifth run in the fifth inning, in which she also walked two batters. Indianapolis scored three more runs against reliever Courtnie Spain in the sixth, bringing their scoring to a close at 8.

Though the Lady Jackets only needed one run to extend play into a seventh inning, the batters were unable to produce. Cedarville finished the game with four hits, two of which came from Shelby Young, and Missy Murphy and Courtney Teague each had one. Rowe said that the Greyhounds’ pitcher, who is 30-5 on the year, was the main factor in silencing Cedarville’s offense.

“Their pitcher was just phenomenal with her drop ball,” he said. “It just ‘fell off the table’ when it was coming into the plate. We’re good, but when we go against the real good players, we don’t have enough consistent hitting.”

The Lady Jackets take the field at Ursuline College in a doubleheader Wednesday. Rowe said Cedarville has to win both these games in order to play home on Monday to get a “play in” game to make the Ohio Independent Championship. Rowe said that his team should be able to beat Ursuline because he thinks Cedarville is better in every phase of the game, but games can be unpredictable.

Also coming up for the Lady Jackets is the NCCAA Midwest Regional, which will take place in Spring Arbor, Mich., on Friday and Saturday. Cedarville will face Spring Arbor University at 1 on Friday, then Indiana Wesleyan University in the afternoon.

The Ohio Independent Championship is scheduled for May 3-4, but Rowe said that his team really has to focus on just getting into Ohio Independent play.

“If we get into the tournament, we’re as good as any team,” he said. “We can beat anybody, so we’ve just got to get into the tournament.”