March 12, 2007

George Washington Stats | Rider Stats

KISSIMMEE, Fla. - Cleveland State rallied for two runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to pull out a 3-2 victory over Rider on Monday afternoon in the Rebel Spring Games. The Vikings fell earlier in the day to George Washington by a 1-0 margin. CSU now stands at 6-1 on the year.

Trailing Rider 2-1 heading into their final at-bat, Whitney Willard started the winning rally with a single to right field. She then picked up her fourth stolen base of the game and came around to score on a single by Christa Coppus.

CSU then put runners on second and third with one out following a walk, a pair of wild pitches and a stolen base. The Vikings put the squeeze on and Sarah Milosek delivered a perfect bunt to score Coppus with the winning run.

Coppus and Willard paced CSU's offensive attack with three hits each.

Amanda Macenko improved to 4-1 with a strong 5.1 innings in relief of starter Christina Swierz. She gave up just three hits and an unearned run while fanning a career-high eight batters.

Lauren Brunner took the loss for Rider, surrendering 12 hits in the complete game effort.

"We struggled today to string hits together, but we came up big when it mattered in the second game," CSU head coach Angie Nicholson said. "It was good for us to be tested today because it will only help us later in the season."

In the opener, the Colonials pushed across the game's only run on an RBI double by Tori Sensi in the fourth inning.

Amanda Gabriel made the run stand up, scattering five hits while striking out four.

Macenko suffered her first loss of the season, giving up seven hits and her first earned run of the season while fanning four.

Haley Keller had a pair of hits to lead CSU.

Cleveland State plays a pair of games on Tuesday, taking on Lafayette at 3:00 p.m. and Manhattan at 5:00 p.m.