The final two innings of the Penn softball team's first game against Dartmouth ended up setting the tone for the entire road trip.
After leading, 3-0, going into the bottom of the sixth inning, the Quakers allowed two runs in the sixth and two more in the seventh in dropping a 4-3 heartbreaker.
The Quakers (11-26, 0-10 Ivy League) went on to lose the next three games -- one to the Big Green, and two to Harvard -- by a combined score of 23-2.
"This weekend was pretty rough," Penn freshman Courtney Dilts said.
But it didn't begin that way for the Quakers.
After four scoreless innings in the first game, the Red and Blue's bats came alive in the fifth -- sort of.
Penn scored three runs in that fifth inning, yet did not register a single hit, as the Big Green committed three errors.
Zahya Hantz led off the inning, reaching on an error and then advancing to second on a passed ball. She scored when fellow freshman Kristi Hackett's infield shot was wildly thrown by the Dartmouth third baseman.
Hackett and Lindsay Wagner later scored on another error by the Big Green, giving the Quakers a 3-0 advantage.
In all, the three players who reached base for Penn did so by an error, a walk and a fielder's choice, and so Dartmouth pitcher Danica Giugliano was not tagged with any earned runs in the inning.
But in the bottom of the sixth Quakers pitcher Nicole Borgstadt walked Dartmouth's Kisa Brannen, who -- after advancing on two groundouts -- later scored on a wild pitch.
The Quakers would later allow an unearned run of their own when Penn catcher Danielle Landolt's attempt to catch the Big Green's Lisa Caruso stealing sailed into center field.
Dartmouth got the first RBI of the game in the seventh when Sarah Damon plated Kerry Conwith a double to tie the score. After the Big Green loading the bases, Cherie Corneau singled, scoring Damon with the winning run.
"The loss definitely hurt us for the rest of the day," Dilts said. "We were very disappointed in ourselves."
The next contest was indeed all Dartmouth, as the mercy rule was called in the sixth when the Big Green were up, 8-0.
The Quakers did not fare any better on Sunday against Harvard, as the powerful Crimson (21-7, 7-1) won a pair of contests, 7-2 and 8-0.
In the first game, the Quakers against only managed unearned runs, cutting the Crimson's lead to 6-2 when Dilts singled, scoring Jen Moore.
Earlier in the inning, Veronica Richardson reached first base on an error but picked up an RBI as Crista Farrell scored.
Although the Quakers had two runners on with only one out after Dilts's hit, they could not score any more runs.
Dilts went 2 for 3 in the first game.
In the second game, the Quakers again had the mercy rule invoked as the Crimson went up by eight runs. Veronica Richardson picked up Penn's only hit in the contest.
"I don't think Harvard really had strong pitching," Dilts said. "We just can't get two hits put together back-to-back."
The Quakers travel to Lehigh today to make up a previously-scheduled doubleheader that was rained out earlier this month. The Engineers are 22-11 overall and are currently the frontrunner for the Patriot League championship.
"We just need to get our offense together," Dilts said. "We just really have been lacking in our offense."
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