Jess Lupardus is glad that she won't be facing Cornell's Samantha Hare again anytime soon.
In game one of yesterday's doubleheader, Lupardus allowed just three runs in eight innings. The first came off a Hare solo home run in the fourth inning, the first hit that Lupardus allowed.
And with two outs in the top of the eighth, Hare strolled to the plate again. This time, her blast cleared the left field fence and bounced in the last lane of the highway behind Warren Field, landing in the Schuylkill.
Lupardus dropped to a crouch at the instant of contact, and Penn lost the game, 3-1.
It was that kind of weekend for the Quakers, who dropped all four games to the Big Red by a combined score of 27-8.
"I didn't think we played well at all on Saturday and I think we played a lot better Sunday, but we didn't play well enough to beat them," Quakers coach Leslie King said.
In game two yesterday, Emily Denstedt surrendered six runs in the first inning, and with Cornell's Ali Tomlinson - who shut out the Quakers on Saturday - pitching, it looked like it could be a repeat of Saturday's 11-2 game-one slaughter.
Annie Kinsey, who had four of Penn's 12 hits in the first three games, led off the bottom of the first with a home run. In the third, with a runner on, Kinsey took a big swing and fouled the pitch off her foot. She dropped her bat and was still limping when she re-entered the box. But on the next pitch, she erased the pain, and part of the lead, with a two-run home run to left.
Denstedt was removed after the first in favor of freshman Taylor Tieman, who gave up two runs in three innings. Lupardus came in and reestablished herself as the stopper, pitching three quick, scoreless innings, allowing only one hit.
While the offense picked itself up with two more runs in the third, it just wasn't enough to mount the comeback.
In the bottom of the seventh Kinsey stepped into the box hoping to be the spark plug yet again. She hit a blooper behind second base. But before it could fall in for a hit, Cornell's second baseman Devon March dove for the ball and made a tumbling catch, silencing the Quakers' cheers and bats. It was clear that the Quakers were just outmatched.
"With any other team, [those balls] would be dropping," Kinsey said.
But from the first pitch on Saturday, nothing was dropping the Quakers way. In the first twin bill, Penn was pounded, 11-2, in the opener. Lupardus gave up five runs over two innings - including a two-run double by Hare. It was the second highest run total Lupardus has surrendered all season, in her shortest start.
But pitching wasn't the only problem. In game one, Penn committed three errors and managed just two hits off of Cornell ace Jenn Meunier, who is now an astonishing 15-1.
Game two was much of the same story. The Quakers fell 5-0 in a four-hit, one-error performance. Denstedt was the victim of the Big Red bats this time, giving up five runs in 5.1 innings. Her counterpart, Tomlinson, struck out eight in a complete game shutout that improved her record to 10-4.
The four losses increased the Quakers' losing streak to eight. To attempt to stop the slide, Penn needs to go back to the basics.
"We know how to play this game, its just a matter of doing our job," Lupardus said.
