Comeback Falls Short, Softball Splits With Penn

In the first of two doubleheaders this weekend, Harvard softball split games with Penn (11-14, 6-2 Ivy) on Saturday, losing a well-contested 5-4 game in the nightcap after pummeling the Quakers—who entered the matchup with an undefeated record in Ivy League play—10-0 in the opener.

“It’s tough not to feel bad after a day like this, because of course we wanted to win both,” said junior second baseman Ellen Macadam. “It’s very disappointing that we couldn’t pull it out in the end, but there were a lot of really good things today. [Sophomore Rachel Brown] pitched [well] in the first game, and we did a lot of great things offensively.”

The Crimson, which sits atop the Ivy League North Division standings, had an impressive day at the plate, scoring a total of 14 runs against a squad that came into the afternoon leading the South Divison.

PENN 5, HARVARD 4

An outburst of five runs in the second inning led Penn past the Crimson in Saturday’s second game. The Quakers, batting first, came out on fire in their only inning of scoring. A run by sophomore pinch runner Elora Daniele on a wild pitch opened up the floodgates, and after Penn batted arond, the onslaught was finally ended with a key tag-out by senior catcher Jess Pledger and an out on a ground ball.

“In the second inning, our pitching gave up a bunch of runs,” Harvard coach Jenny Allard said. “That set us back five runs. I think it deflated us a bit and we needed to come right back and score...and we didn’t do that.”

Harvard opened the scoring in the first inning of the nightcap, as senior center fielder Stephanie Krysiak crossed home plate on an illegal pitch. The Crimson didn’t add another run until the fourth inning, when Macadam batted in junior left fielder Emily Henderson, who had reached base on a double.

“We had a lull in the middle innings,” Allard said. “We started to come on in the sixth inning; we were close and just ran out of time. The difference was [that in the first game] we had the lead and kept the lead.”

A strong two-run comeback effort by the Crimson—led by a 2-RBI single from co-captain Melissa Schellberg, who is also a Crimson sports editor—in the sixth inning fell short. Penn ended the game with a double play in the bottom of the seventh.

The loss was especially disappointing for the Crimson, as every individual, including the seniors, suffered their first career loss to Penn.

“Before today, Penn had never beaten any one of us,” Macadam said. “They’re always a good, strong opponent, but they had never been able to pull it out against anyone on the team currently. We were [undefeated] before today. We have a tough rivalry with them, not wanting to let them beat us.”

HARVARD 10, PENN 0

The first game of the series ended after the top of the fifth, as Harvard’s dominant pitching and ample scoring elicited the mercy rule.

“Offensively, we were strong,” Allard said. “We really were aggressive early in [the] count...and had some really good presence at the plate today.”

Eight players scored for the Crimson, led by Macadam and sophomore first baseman Whitney Shaw with two runs each. Shaw and freshman pitcher Jess Ferri each added a home run.

“We were just stringing them together,” Macadam said. “We really just came out firing. Every game is so important in the way softball works, to get to the championship, so we just really wanted to kill them. They were undefeated, and we wanted to show them we were better.”

Brown played well on Saturday, pitching the entire first game and allowing no runs on five hits to capture her seventh win of the season. Though the shutout was in jeopardy several times, Brown and the Harvard defense came up big each time with key outs.

The Quakers loaded the bases late in the third inning and left two runners on base at the end of the fourth, but were unable to capitalize on either of these opportunities. The strong defensive effort and hot bats helped the Crimson to the blowout victory.

“We’ve been approaching one game at a time, one pitch at a time,” Allard said. “We had a lot of confidence going into today, where we were playing strong against Princeton and Cornell [last weekend]...It was just disappointing that we came up short the second game.”