Softball splits with LaSalle

The dozen or so La Salle fans camped on a set of old wooden bleachers had already begun to pack up their things and go home when Penn senior Stacey Thompson sent a double bouncing off the orange mesh fencing in left field. With the Penn softball team down to its final out, and trailing 3-2 with the bases empty, a Quaker comeback looked about as likely as a San Diego Padres' pennant. Penn had managed to scrape up only three runs all afternoon, and hadn't led in either game. But Thompson's double sent a surge of hope through the Quaker dugout, and brought freshman clean-up hitter Vicki Moore to the plate with a chance to be a hero. Moore answered the challenge by belting a 1-2 pitch back through the box and into center field. Thompson came roaring around third on the play and just beat the throw to the plate with a head-first slide. Suddenly, it was a whole new ballgame. "I didn't have a hit all day," Moore said. "Stacey was standing out on second base and she yelled over to coach, 'Don't worry. She'll get a hit.' There was a lot of pressure, but I just knew I had to hit the ball." Senior Hilary Stamos then proved why she's Penn's best clutch hitter, crushing an RBI triple into the gap in right-center for her third hit of the ballgame. The Explorers botched the relay throw, allowing Stamos to score and giving Penn a 5-3 lead. "We just don't give up," Penn coach Linda Carothers said. "We didn't panic out there. We hit the ball really well right when we needed to hit the ball well -- late in the game when it mattered." In the bottom of the seventh, Moore closed out the game in stellar fashion, striking out the last two batters looking to earn the complete game victory. Moore didn't yield an earned run and struck out eight. "Those are the things that we're capable of," Carothers said. "It was a real character thing. When we got ahead, we were playing to win. We weren't playing not to lose and that's a real big thing that a lot of people don't understand. This team doesn't do that." In a 5-1 loss in the first game, the Quakers hurt themselves with poor defense. Senior Lanie Moore gave up only five hits, but three key errors led to four unearned runs. Offensively, Penn hit the ball hard in every inning, but could only manage a single run when sophomore Abby Shore scored after a leadoff triple in the fifth. "We really drove the ball in the first game," Carothers said. "But we just couldn't get anything to fall." Coaches and players from both teams complained bitterly about the quality of the umpiring, particularly behind the plate. In the seventh inning of the second game, La Salle coach Ray Perri finally exploded and was ejected as he directed a tirade of expletives as the home plate umpire. "When the opposing coach got thrown out, I congratulated him," Carothers said. "We both have had this official and knew he was bad. There wasn't anything he didn't say that I would like to have said. The ump was just inconsistent. "You know you build a program and then you just have somebody who walks on the field and deregulates everything because he does what he wants to do whenever he wants to do it. But, hey, sometimes you get those calls and sometimes those calls break your back. They broke our back in the first game, but he gave us a little bit of a momentum swing in the second game, and we were able to capitalize on that." Vicki Moore felt that the inconsistency in the officiating made it difficult for pitchers on both sides. "The ump didn't really help me or the other girl much," Moore said. "He was really inconsistent, but the coaches just kept telling me I had to pitch my game. They told me not to let him beat me and not to beat myself." · Penn's remained one game below the elusive .500 mark, moving to 13-14. The Explorers improved to 15-11. The Quakers will try to find a winning record when they play two doubleheaders this weekend. Penn will travel to Yale tomorrow for a 1 p.m. contest, and return home Sunday to host Dartmouth at noon at Warren Field. The Elis (11-10, 2-2 Ivy League) are the Ivy League's defending champions and are led by pitcher Jennifer Surface (6-5, 1.81 ERA, 55 K), who didn't surrender an earned run in Ivy League play last year. At the plate, Yale is paced by designated player Cindy Teti (.357 BA) and shortstop Amanda Taft (.345). At Dartmouth, softball is not an official varsity sport.

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