Stand up for sea grant
May 11, 2017
Nicholls basketball gets 2 commitments
May 11, 2017
On paper, Nicholls and Lamar were almost identical.
The Colonels and Cardinals were separated by just one game in the Southland Conference softball standings heading into the past weekend’s three-game series between the teams – a weekend date which would decide the No. 2 seed in this week’s Southland Conference Tournament.
In the end, Nicholls prevailed – albeit narrowly.
But there’s a high probability the two foes will meet again this week in Conway, Arkansas, and when they do, the stakes will be higher than ever.
The Colonels took two out of three games from the Cardinals, scoring two-straight close, hardfought road wins to rally back from a mercy rule loss to start the series.
With the wins, Nicholls ends its regular season with a 35-18 record and a 19-8 mark in the conference.
They will be the No. 2 seed in the SLC Tournament, which begins Wednesday.
They’ll face the winner between No. 3 Lamar and No. 6 Northwestern State at 4 p.m. – the moment the team has been building to all season, according to coach Angel Santiago.
“Our goal is to play our best when the games matter the most,” Santiago said earlier this season. “We want to compete for championships and be a club that pushes for bids in the NCAA Tournament and conference titles. The kids have bought into the program and there have been some rough moments – some times that have tested our patience. But everyone has been great, and the process is going very, very well.”
Against Lamar, it was a microcosm of that “process” that Santiago talked about.
The Colonels had to wait a little win to get the success they wanted for.
Game one of the series was arguably the worst game Nicholls has played in the entire Southland schedule – the first time in league play that the Colonels were mercy ruled.
Lamar did just about everything right in the win, scoring three runs in the bottom of the first and third innings to take control of the game with a 6-0 advantage.
From there, the outcome was no longer in doubt, because the Cardinals were dominant in the circle.
Lamar starting pitcher Ciara Luna used the lead with style, limiting the Colonels to just one hit in the game – an innocent single from nine-hole hitter Brooklyn Devine. Luna faced just 16 batters in her five innings (one above the minimum) and threw just 47 pitches.
With the huge lead and with Nicholls unable to trim the deficit, the Cardinals finished the deal, generating lone runs in the fourth and fifth innings to send the game to an 8-0, mercy-rule finish
The final blow was a walk-off single from left fielder Ashley McDowell, which ended the game and temporarily tied the teams in the Southland Conference standings.
But the Colonels didn’t stay down for long.
About 30 minutes after game one, the teams met again and this time, the Colonels were the ones with that feel-good feeling of victory when the final pitch had been tossed.
Like game one, Lamar led for most of game two – an advantage earned in the bottom of the first inning on a sacrifice fly from Kelly Meeuwsen.
That lead held up all the way to the sixth inning when the Colonels landed a late-inning flurry – a staple of the team’s run through the regular season.
Nicholls scored two in the top of the sixth inning to take the lead – a rally capped by a twoRBI double from Veronica Villafranco to put the Colonels on top 2-1.
After a shutdown inning by pitcher Megan Landry in the bottom of the sixth, Nicholls added two more insurance runs in the seventh inning to secure the win.
Lamar rallied in the bottom of the seventh inning, loading the bases with two outs off Landry.
The Cardinals drew an RBI walk to cut the lead to 4-2, but Landry thwarted the rally, inducing a lazy fly out, which ended the game and evened the series until Saturday afternoon’s rubber match.
The script for that game was almost identical to the second game of the series with Lamar holding an early lead, then squandering it late.
The Cardinals scored two runs on a two-RBI double by Maddy Myers in the bottom of the fourth inning to take a 2-0 lead – an advantage that looked good because Luna had stymied the Colonels for most of the early stages of the game.
But in the late innings, the Colonels cracked the code, getting a sacrifice fly in the top of the fifth to trim the lead to 2-1, then exploding for two runs in the sixth to take the lead for good.
Samantha Mracich started the scoring in the sixth-inning rally with an RBI infield single to tie the game.
The next batter, Amanda Gianelloni, gave Nicholls the lead, pushing a ball deep into right field – a sacrifice fly which scored Sydney Bourg.
After that rally, the Colonels still needed six outs to win the series, but Landry was up to the challenge, getting the Cardinals up and down in order in both innings to seal the win and the series victory.
After taking two out of three games at Lamar over the weekend, the Nicholls softball team earned the No. 2 overall seed in the Southland Conference Tournament. But the Colonels and Cardinals may well meet again this week at the Southland Conference Tournament, which begins today in Arkansas.
