IRVING, Texas – The Trinity softball team finished off a Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference weekend sweep by defeating the University of Dallas 7-3 on Saturday afternoon.
The Tigers improved to 19-9 this season, which includes a 7-2 conference record that is tied for second in the standings. The Crusaders dropped to 3-19 overall and 0-9 in SCAC. Trinity won 10-1 and 5-1 in yesterday's doubleheader to open the weekend.
Trinity jumped out to a 6-0 lead before Dallas got on the scoreboard, pounding out a total of 11 hits in the game. The home team scored once in each of the final three innings, but the Tigers got a double play and a strikeout in the seventh inning to finish off the sweep.
Megan Kriechbaum (Cedar Hills, Utah / Pleasant Grove) took a no-hitter into the seventh inning to earn the win and improve to 2-0 this season. She struck out three batters, allowing three runs (two earned) on two hits.
Josephine Koelewyn (Reno, Nev. / Academy of Arts Careers and Technology) came in to finish off the final inning of the game, relieving Kriechbaum after the first two batters singled to break up the no-hitter. After the runners stole second and third, Dallas drew a walk to load the bases. Koelewyn induced a double play that brought in a run, then she struck out the final batter.
Marina Delaluna (Concord, Calif. / Concord) got the second inning started with a leadoff double, followed by a single by
Carsyn Lee (Flower Mound, Texas / Flower Mound).
Peyton Bowser (Arvada, Colo. / West) and
Hayden Del Toro (Cypress, Texas / Cy Woods) had back-to-back RBI ground outs after that to give the Tigers a 2-0 lead. Meanwhile, Kriechbaum retired the first seven batters she faced and didn't allow a hit until the seventh.
Trinity's offense added three more runs in the third inning, packaging four hits with an error to take a 5-0 lead. After
Samantha Tagawa (Agoura Hills, Calif. / Agoura Hills) reached on an error to start the inning,
Hannah Boudreaux (Pearland, Texas / Shadow Creek) knocked her in two batters later to start the scoring. Lee and Bowser both had RBI singles later in the inning, scoring Boudreaux and
Jordyn Williams (Clayton, Calif. / Clayton Valley Charter).
The fifth inning featured another Tiger run, but a double play by the Dallas defense kept Trinity from an even bigger inning. Boudreaux and Williams singled to start the inning, then Delaluna drove in a run for a 6-0 lead. The double play, then a lineout back up the middle ended the inning.
Dallas got its first run in the bottom of the fifth, despite not getting a hit, combining two walks with a wild pitch and a groundout to make it 6-1. Trinity scored on a wild pitch in the top of the sixth to get the run back and push the lead to 7-1. Del Toro singled to start the inning, then stole second, then moved to third on a groundout. The wild pitch allowed her to get home, then the Tigers had two more ground balls to end the inning. The Crusaders took advantage of a Trinity error to make it 7-2 in the bottom of the sixth, then broke through with their first hit in the seventh. That set up Koelewyn's relief appearance that squashed any hopes for a comeback.
Boudreaux led the Tigers with a 3-for-4 performance in the game, while Bowser collected two RBI. Williams, Delaluna, and Lee all had two hits each and seven different players scored runs in the game.
Up Next
Trinity returns home next weekend for more SCAC action, hosting Austin College in a three-game series that begins with a Saturday doubleheader at 5:00 p.m. The series finale is set for Sunday, April 7, at 12:00 p.m.
