The Hillsdale College softball team won 5-1 against Quincy University on Sunday March 6 after a weekend of four games in Springfield, IL. They lost the other games 6-3 and 4-3 on Saturday March 5 against University of Illinois Springfield (UIS) and 6-3 against Quincy University.
Sophomore pitcher Erin won G-MAC Pitcher of the Week after pitching her second start of the season for the team’s winning game. Kapteyn has pitched 19.2 innings with a 1.07 ERA and 14 strikeouts.
“I think the games went much better this weekend,” junior utility player Jenna Cantalupo said. “I felt that we were more prepared and played looser. As much as I believe bad luck has played a deciding role in some of the losses we’ve been handed, there are still things we need to clean up. I think that once we start fully playing all 7 innings, wins will fall our way.”
This weekend, the team had 14 runs and 33 hits, up two from last week and 10 from the weekend prior. Freshman outfielder Olivia Latimer had a hit in all four games.
“It was good to be able to do my job for the team this weekend,” Latimer said. “This weekend was really a turning point for us hitting-wise, so I’m really excited to see where that takes us next week in Florida and for the rest of our season.”
On Saturday, The Chargers had the lead against UIS Prairie Stars until the tail end of both games. In game one, a big sixth inning allowed the Prairie Stars to pull ahead for the 6-3 win. In game two, a walk-off double in the bottom of the seventh inning broke the 3-3 tie for a 4-3 victory.
“Our defense made great plays,” Coach Kyle Gross said. “University of Illinois Springfield is a very fast team, and they’re very aggressive on the base paths. We held them in check for three quarters of both games through playing solid defense and pitching.”
On Sunday, the Chargers split the games, taking home a win in the first game. The fourth inning in the second game had four defensive errors from Hillsdale that led Quincy to score all of their runs and eventually win the game. The Chargers also battled 20 mph winds throughout the games on Sunday.
“Even though the ones in Texas were still worse, those two have been the worst two wind games I’ve ever played,” Gross said.
The team will be traveling to Florida from March 11 to March 20 for 12 games. Six of those games will be played from March 15-17 as a part of the annual Spring Games against teams from the Northeast and Midwest regions. The other six games will pit the team against opponents from Florida.
“We’ve kind of started off with a rocky start, but traditionally, while we’re on our spring trip, we kind of find our footing and start playing better,” Gross said. “That’s the hope again this year. We would love to start off the season great and play well over spring break, but traditionally, it’s where we’ve started to turn things around.”
