Feb. 14, 2009
Stats
TEMPE, Ariz. -
Illinois State jumped out to a early lead outscoring Chattanooga, 8-2 in the early morning game, but was unable to pull ahead of Iowa as the `Birds fell to the Hawkeyes, 6-2, in the second game of the Littlewood Classic at Farrington Stadium Saturday.
Illinois State picked up its first win of the Littlewood Classic against Chattanooga topping the Lady Mocs, 8-2. The win ended the Redbirds two-game losing streak and was freshman pitcher Jordan Birch's first win in the circle (1-3). UTC falls to 4-6 on the season and 0-3 in the tournament.
"Jordan has started several ball games for us and I thought that she has done well in the circle," said head coach Melinda Fischer. "We hadn't been able to give her one run so I think that we made up for lack of run production behind her today."
The Redbirds started out the with four-straight hits off the bats of Niki Stansell, Amber Smith, Casey Gorrell and Abby Olson which resulted in four runs giving the `Birds an early 4-0 lead in the first inning.
"I thought that we played pretty well especially that first inning we got a jump offensively on them," said Fischer. "I thought that it was great to see those bats starting to work for us."
Stansell collected her second homerun of the tournament and third of the season. Stansell, a junior transfer from Georgia, was 3-of-4 in the game and collected two RBI. Olson went 2-of-3 in the game with a two-run homerun, her first homerun of the season.
In the second game, Iowa came back from a two-point deficit early in the game to defeat Illinois State, 6-2. The Redbirds were able to get out to a fast start as Iowa's pitcher Amanda Zust walked three-straight batters before Katie Mathis hit a line drive sending Olson and Gorrell home for a two-run RBI.
However, the Redbirds were unable to put a stop to a strong Iowa offense as pitcher Smith scattered five hits and allowed six runners to score, in four and two-thirds innings in the circle before being lifted by freshman Megan Warner.
Smith and the Redbirds ran into to trouble in the third inning when Iowa loaded the bases with no outs and was able to score five runs on three hits giving the Hawekeyes a 5-2 lead.
"I thought that we had some good at bats," said Fischer. "I thought that once we had the third inning, a horrible defensive inning, we really got down on ourselves. This ball game was too young in the third inning to let anything like that dictate what we did the rest of the game, but I think that it took us a couple of innings to get out of it."
The Redbirds who are now 3-6, will conclude their trip to Arizona Sunday. Illinois State will face Kent State at noon CST in its final game of the Littlewood Classic at Farrington Stadium.
