SOFTBALL

The Forester softball team headed south to the Bluegrass State for a pair of games at Georgetown College. HU came away with a lopsided 15-5 win over Montreat College (6-8) before being blanked, 4-0, by the host Tigers.

It was a slugfest against the Cavaliers with Gower’s crew getting the better end of the deal. HU finished with 19 hits, five for extra bases, to Montreat’s ten. Huntington was in control throughout the contest with a 7-5 difference in the second proving the closest MC would get.

The afternoon featured three long balls with HU accounting for two of them, a three-run blast by Kiera Stacy in the third and a solo shot by Sophia Beachy in the sixth. Stacy added a pair of RBI-singles to her bottom line to finish with three hits and five RBI while Beachy smacked a double to drive in two runs in the first and collected a single along the way for three hits and three RBI.

Jada Crofoot also posted big numbers for the Foresters by going 4-for-5 at the plate and driving in five runs and scoring three times. Other players to log multiple hits for HU included Hannah Shoupe, Paige Eichelberger and Jenessa Hasty with two apiece.

The game was called an inning short compliments of the eight-run rule. The Foresters scored at least one run in every innings except the fourth and proved Huntington’s first double-digit win of the season.

McKyndsea Burke went the distance to pick up the win. She gave up ten hits, five runs and a walk with one strikeout.

While hits were a plenty in the opener, that wasn’t the case in HU’s second game of the day as the two teams combined for just ten hits. Georgetown (12-5) finished with six of them and posted three in the bottom of the sixth in addition to taking advantage of an errant throw to touch home four times which accounted for all of the game’s scoring.

Up to that point, Meghan Fretz had held the hosts in check by scattering just three hits in the previous five frames. When all was said and done, the junior hurler was charged with the loss by giving up six hits, four runs, only two of which were earned, and two walks while striking out one.

Eichelberger and Crofoot each pounded out two hits which was all the offense HU mustered.

With this split, HU moves to 3-4 on the year. Next up is a doubleheader with Manchester tomorrow at 3:30 p.m.