March 22, 2016
By: Ryan Schadewald, sports information assistant
ADA, Ohio - The Bluffton University softball team split a pair with the Ohio Northern University Polar Bears on Wednesday, March 22. The Beavers won the opener by a score of 10-4, before falling 9-8 in the nightcap. Bluffton’s record holds steady at the .500 mark as they sit at 8-8, while Ohio Northern now stands 10-8 on the campaign.
The scoring in game one began in the third inning as Josie McElroy (Mt. Orab/Western Brown) doubled in Kelsi Wilson (Pataskala/Licking Heights) and Chelsea Zoltowski (Sylvania/Southview) scored McElroy on a base hit, giving Bluffton a 2-0 lead through three.
ONU cut the deficit to 2-1 going into the sixth frame before the Beavers loaded the bases. Jessie Madzia (Massillon/Tuslaw) began the rally with an RBI single, McElroy pushed in a run after being hit and Brittany Huff (Clayton/Northmont) drove in two more with a single to center as Bluffton led 6-1 through six frames.
The Beavers added four more insurance runs in the seventh, including a three-run bomb off the bat of Jessie Madzia, wrapping up game one of the double dipper, 10-4.
Emily Sculpholm (Cuyahoga Falls/Our Lady of the Elms) evened her record at 4-4 with the complete-game victory. She gave up four runs on 10 hits, three of those runs coming as unearned tallies in the final frame. Sculpholm also struck out six Polar Bears while walking two.
Brittany Huff led the bats for the Beavers, grabbing three hits and two RBI, while Jessie Madzia, Josie McElroy, and Carly Levindofske (Brunswick/Magnificat) all finished with two safeties in the win. Madzia led Bluffton with her four RBI, three of them coming from her seventh-inning home run.
The nightcap saw Ohio Northern score five runs in the fourth inning, dooming the Beavers to a 9-8 defeat.
The Polar Bears would jump out to a 3-0 lead in the first two frames off starter Nicole Thomas (Tontogany/Otsego). But the Beavers responded in the third, as Brittany Huff knocked a 1-0 pitch out of the park for her third dinger of the season, knotting the game at 3-3 in the middle of the frame.
The Beavers plated three unearned runs in the top of the fourth inning to jump out to a 6-3 lead, before Thomas ran into more trouble and gave up five in the bottom half of the inning to trail 8-6 through four innings of play.
The Beavers tied the game again at 8-8 in the fifth inning as Jessie Madzia added a two-run single to get Thomas off the hook with a no-decision.
Ohio Northern drove in what would become the winning run in the bottom of the fifth as Kylie Asmus singled to center field to make the score 9-8. The final two frames were scoreless as the Beavers dropped the nightcap.
Nicole Thomas gave up eight runs and nine hits in 3.2 innings of work. Jessie Madzia picked up a tough loss, giving up just one run in 2.1 frames.
Madzia also led the offense, going 3-for-4 with two RBI in game two, giving her five hits and six RBI for the day! McElroy would add two hits and Huff finished with three runs batted in.
The Beavers jump right back into action on Wednesday, March 23, as they return home to take on the Heidelberg University Student Princes. First pitch is set for 3:30 p.m.
-BEAVERS-
