For immediate release – 4/21/2011 - #357

Hornets Split Games at ODAC Softball Tournament

SALEM, VA – Seventh-seeded Lynchburg College pulled off an upset Thursday but dropped a late game at the 2011 Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) Softball Championship Tournament, hosted at the James I. Moyer Sports Complex.

Lynchburg and #2 Bridgewater College went to extra innings where the Hornets prevailed 5-3 in nine innings. The teams played three scoreless innings before the Eagles plated a single run in the bottom of the fourth. The Hornets answered with two in the top of the fifth, scoring on a Katie Bruce single and an Ashley Hohenberger suicide squeeze bunt. BC tied the game at two all with a run in its half of the fifth and neither team could manufacture a run in the sixth or seventh to force extra innings. Melanie Tenney hit a fielder's choice to score a run in the eighth but the Eagles did the same in the eighth. Meagan Fredenberg and Hohenberger each had RBI singles in the ninth and Bruce recorded three straight out in the bottom of the ninth to end the game.

Bruce scattered eight hits and a walk over her nine innings of work, allowing just two earned runs. Heather Jenkins allowed seven hits, seven walks and three earned runs with seven strikeouts for the Eagles (25-9). Nicole Shipp was 2-2 for LC and Fredenberg also had two hits.

Fifth-seeded Virginia Wesleyan College got off to an early start offensively in the nightcap, scoring single runs in the first and second and two each in the third and fourth. Marlin MacKenzie Creech had a no-hitter through four and a third innings, but the Hornets loaded the bases in the fifth and scored twice on a Tenney single and a fielder's choice to cut the lead to 6-2, but Creech didn't allow a runner in the sixth or seventh to cruise to victory. She allowed two hits and three walks with four strikeouts. Four hitters had two-hit games for the Marlins (27-9)

The Hornets (21-17) will play EMU Friday at 11 a.m. in an elimination game.

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