FLORENCE, SC – Graduate student right-hander
Jenna Walling came within one out of would have been only the fifth perfect game in program history, but settled for a two-hit shutout as 10th-ranked Francis Marion University run-ruled Barton College 8-0 to sweep Tuesday's (March 10) Conference Carolinas softball doubleheader. The Patriots won the opener 4-2 as Walling tossed a five-hit complete game.
Francis Marion improves to 21-6 overall and 6-2 in conference play. The Patriots will play a pair of road conference twinbills this weekend: Friday at 2 p.m at Southern Wesleyan University and Saturday at noon at Young Harris College.
In picking up two wins, Walling (15-3) pitched 13 innings, allowed only seven hits and one earned run, while striking out 17 and walking no one.
In the night cap, the Johns Island, S.C., native retired the first 17 batters she faced before surrendering an infield single. After another single, she retired the next batter on a foul out – a ball caught by senior left field
Anderson Thrower sliding into the tarp along the left side fencing. Walling recorded eight strikeouts in the contest.
Senior shortstop
Madalyn White returned to the Patriot line-up on Tuesday and was on base three times in the second contest with a pair of hits and a walk, while scoring twice and stealing three bases. Walling also added two hits at the plate.
Francis Marion took a 3-0 advantage in the first frame. White led off with a single up the middle, moved to second on an infield single by Thrower, stole third, and scored on a bunt single by junior designated player
McKenzie Jewell. Thrower later scored on a sacrifice fly by senior third baseman
Rylie Webster and Jewell came home on a wild pitch.
FMU upped the margin to 5-0 in the fourth when a run scored on a passed ball, and when the ball bounded into the Patriot dugout, a second runner was awarded home.
The eight-run mercy rule came into play when Francis Marion plated three runs in the bottom of the sixth. Senior second baseman
Maddy Golka walked with the bases loaded and senior center fielder
Mikaela Goss drilled a two-run walk-off single to center.
Freshman righty Haley Inman (5-5), the first of five Barton hurlers, was tagged with the loss.
In Tuesday's first game, Webster tallied two hits and drove in three runs, while White was on base three times and scored twice.
Walling fanned nine and scattered five hits.
Barton (12-12, 3-3) scored an unearned run in the top of the first inning, but FMU answered with three runs in the bottom of the frame. White walked to lead off the frame, went to second on a sacrifice bunt, took third on a passed ball, and scored on an RBI-double to the right-center field gap by Jewell. Three pitched later, Webster lined a two-run triple off the top of the left-center field wall.
Both team's scored single runs in the sixth to account for the final score. The Patriot run came when White reached on a bunt single and later scored on a two-out, run-scoring single to left-center by Webster.
Sophomore right-hander Emily Bobo (6-6) was the game-one loser.
White, the program's all-time hits leader, extended her streak of safely reaching base to 35 games dating back to last season. Thrower extended her hitting streak to 14 contests, while Jewell has reached base safely in 23 straight games this year.
