Just one week after the Penn softball team swept La Salle, winning game two in walk-off fashion, it's getting a taste of its own medicine. Yesterday, the Quakers were on the losing end of a walk-off - twice - as Temple topped them 3-2 and 4-3 on the north side of Philadelphia.
Holding a 3-1 lead in game two and needing just one out to shut the door, the Quakers were undone by a three-run, walk-off blast from Owls freshman Becca Hahn with two outs in the seventh.
The first loss wasn't much easier to take. In a tie game with runners on first and third in the bottom of the seventh, Temple's Anna Rico took off from first. Penn freshman catcher Alisha Prystowsky hesitated before deciding to throw through to second base. Her throw sailed behind second baseman Annie Kinsey and into center field to give Temple (11-12) the walk-off victory.
Coach Leslie King refused to comment or make her players available for comment, only saying that both games were tough losses.
Jessie Lupardus pitched all six innings, allowing two earned-runs and striking out nine. Her record fell to 14-5, while her earned-run average rose above 1.00, to a still-impressive 1.03.
But the Quakers (18-12, 5-3 Ivy) saw something to which they aren't accustomed: Lupardus was out-pitched. Temple's Brianna Dairy went seven innings and gave up just one earned run on three hits.
Kinsey was 0-for-3 in the first game, but that wasn't the only cause for concern. In her first at-bat of the day, she was hit in the left hand by a pitch. She remained on the ground for a considerable time, but after consulting with the trainer, she decided to stay in the game.
Determined to heal both her wound and her team's from the opener, the senior captain hit an early two-run shot in the nightcap, getting the Quakers off to a good start and setting aside all questions of a serious injury.
(She did, however, make two of Penn's four errors on the day).
Things were going smoothly on the mound in game two, as well. Junior captain Emily Denstedt was cruising. Before she allowed a one-out solo home run in the sixth, she had given up only one hit. Immediately thereafter, still with a 3-1 lead, King decided to pull Denstedt in favor of freshman reliever Taylor Tieman, who has the highest ERA on the staff.
Tieman got the final two outs of the sixth, but pitched her way into trouble in the seventh. With two on and two out, she surrendered the biggest blow of the day: the three-run bomb to Hahn.
The Oklahoma native entered the at-bat with a whopping .000 batting average, the only hitless member of the Owls who had at least one at-bat. She had struck out six times in her 14 at-bats.
It took her a while, but the freshman saved her first collegiate hit for the right moment.
