Army West Point Athletics
Army West Point
Colgate
Army Suffers One-Run Loss To Colgate At PL Tournament
May 13, 2011 | Softball
Box Score
Hamilton, N.Y. - No. 4 seed Army tied the game 2-2 with a pair of unearned runs in the top of the third inning, but top seed Colgate snapped it in the bottom of the fifth and rode Rachel LeCoq's three-hitter to a 3-2 Patriot League Tournament opening-round softball win Thursday at Eaton Street Field.
The Black Knights (27-24) drop into the losers' bracket of the double elimination tournament where they face No. 3 seed Holy Cross, who fell to No. 2 Lehigh, 6-4, in the opening game. Army and the Crusaders split their four-game series during the regular-season.
Colgate (26-19) bunched together three of its four hits off freshman pitcher Haley Pypes (15-12) in the bottom of the second inning in scoring a pair of runs on Haley Fleming's two-out single up the middle.
Army answered with two runs in the top of the third after capitalizing on a walk, a hit batsman and a pair of errors to tie the game 2-2. Meghan McGowan opened the inning drawing just the second walk issued by LeCoq, the league's pitcher of the year, and moved to second when the third baseman misplayed Reanna Johnson's grounder. Following back-to-back steals, Army loaded the bases when Amanda Nguyen was hit by a pitch.
Then with one out, the third baseman's overthrow to home plate on Alex Reynolds' grounder allowed McGowan and Johnson to cross safely. Reynolds reached second base, but was stranded when LeCoq induced the next batter to fly out to center field en route to retiring 13 of the final 15 batters she faced.
After giving up the two runs in the second inning, Pypes worked her way out of jams over the next two frames with runners in scoring position on a strikeout in the third inning and a double play in the fourth inning in leaving five runners on base over a three-inning span.
LeCoq nipped Army's hopes of snapping a tied game after being touched for her second infield single to Nguyen in the top of the fifth inning with two outs. After a wild pitch allowed Nguyen to move into scoring position, LeCoq got out safely on a strikeout.
Pypes then got into trouble in the bottom of the fifth inning after issuing a leadoff walk to Jennifer Ortega, who worked her way around on wild pitches to score the tie-breaking run with two outs. The freshman right-hander threw a four-hitter, fanned two and walked five in being tagged with the loss.
LeCoq struck out three of the four batters she faced in the sixth, then retired the side in the seventh in recording six strikeouts, a pair of walks and three hits improving to 17-7.
DIAMOND NOTES: It is the second year that Army fell to Colgate in the opening round of the Patriot League Tournament, while the loss is the sixth straight to the Raiders ... Army is 12-6 in opening round games at the tournament where the Black Knights have met Colgate eight times and show a 6-2 mark ... Amanda Nguyen's two hits boosted her season total to 66.
