Softball ends quietly

The Quakers showed improvement, but has only 12 wins to show. The dust has settled on the infield of Warren Field, as the Penn softball team closes the book on another season. Summer leagues resume, as players are a year more experienced, the freshmen are now veterans and the seniors have played their last game in a Quakers uniform. The Red and Blue finished the season with a lowly 14-21 record, 3-9 in the Ivy League, returning home from this weekend's pair of doubleheaders at Harvard and Dartmouth with only one win. On Saturday, the Quakers were swept by Harvard, losing the first game after the Crimson went up by eight runs to make the final score 10-2, as well as the second game -- a closely contested 5-4 loss. In the first contest, Penn senior Vicki Moore gave up six runs in two innings in her last start on the mound. With 177 K's, Moore ends her career as Penn's all-time strikeout leader. The second game had the same outcome as the first, but the level of play was much higher. Penn scored all four runs in the top of the third inning to go on top, 4-1. However, Harvard tied the score an inning later, where it remained until the bottom of the seventh inning. The Quakers could not keep Harvard off the bases, and despite going the distance, Penn pitcher Joy Silvern gave up the winning run on a controversial play at the plate. Against Harvard, sophomore and Ivy League Player of the Year candidate Sherryl Fodera went 3-for-6 with two RBIs. Sunday, the Quakers were in Hanover, N.H., to play two games against Ivy League cellar dwelling Dartmouth. Penn's only win of the weekend came in the last game of the season, a 5-3 victory over Dartmouth, which earned its first Ivy League victory of the season by beating Penn 4-3 in the first game. Quakers starting pitcher Suzanne Arbogast gave up five hits and only two earned runs in her six innings of work, but Penn's bats did not provide her with enough run support, as she was given the loss. The offense was lively enough to win in the second game, however, as Silvern started her second game of the weekend and picked up her team-leading eighth win. Freshman Michelle Zaptin went 3-for-4 had two RBIs in the win, while freshman Sarah Dominic went 4-for-7 with an RBI against the Big Green. "I'm really glad we finished the season with a win," Silvern said. "It was a season of highs and lows, and I think we will be able to take what we learned this year and build on it next season." While the Quakers continued their seemingly endless streak of losing seasons, the full page spread in Sunday's New York Times about Princeton softball and Tigers coach Cindy Cohen only re-emphasized what fans of Ivy League softball already knew: Princeton is the best team in the Ivy League, despite not having won their their 13th Ivy title in 15 years. Instead, Brown surprised everyone by taking top honors. Looking back on the Quakers' season, there has been definite improvement compared to the teams from the last several years, but the Quakers and coach Linda Carothers still have a long way to come before they can even be mentioned on the same page as Princeton. The level of play from this year's Penn team was erratic. A majority of their wins came against poor teams, including Coppin State, Delaware State and Keene State. The longest winning streak of the season was three games. However, at times, they did play well against top teams, including the sweep of Yale and the four scoreless innings at Princeton. "We have a great nucleus here," Carothers said. "I see the good in what they are doing, but they want to hold on to the bad things, because they are competitors. So my job becomes almost twice as hard to make them stay in the positive -- not the balls that go by, but the stabs they've had and the double plays they have turned." Never gun shy in his days as a Quakers hoopster, Penn Athletic Director Steve Bilsky has stuck with Carothers through the thinnest of seasons, and this year, the softball team took steps in the right direction, proving Bilsky may see something in the softball program. After all, they did win four more games than last season. Next year, the team must improve on this year's limited success. That may mean moving players back to their natural positions, and it may mean an improvement in practice quality. "We have to get everyone feeling good about what they know they are capable of doing regardless of the results," Carothers said. "They have to be able to say 'I can do these things,' 'Maybe I had a bad day' or 'Maybe I didn't do this well,' and understand why it has happened, fix it and get it right."