Done in by seven runs in the final two innings, the UMass Lowell softball team dropped a non-conference bout against Boston University, 9-1, at River View Field on Thursday.
Terrier pitcher Melanie Russell was stout in the circle and contained the River Hawks bats, striking out six while allowing two hits in a complete game effort.
The defeat drops the River Hawks to 8-26 overall, while maintaining their 1-7 mark in the America East. BU nudged their win streak to two and stand 21-18 overall and 5-4 in the Patriot League.
Playing their fifth game in as many days gave UMass Lowell Head Coach
Sean Cotter the opportunity to utilize his bench and allowed a few starters to get some rest before this weekend's action.
"We got a chance to play our bench today which was good," said Cotter. "I thought
Ally Greene had some good at-bats and picked up a hit."
Brittany Younan. Instead, BU's Jayme Mask came in to score on the play before Brittany Clendenny doubled to left to score Younan. The River Hawks got on the board in the fourth inning with back-to-back doubles to left from
Ally Greene (Tewksbury, Mass.) and
Ariana Darcy (Kingston, N.Y.) to cut the deficit to one. Darcy's RBI double extended her hit-streak to four games.
Freshman
Lauren Ramirez (Dracut, Mass.) added four more strikeouts to her team-high 58 k's in the loss. Ramirez gave up four earned runs on six hits over 5.2 innings.
"Lauren [Ramirez] was real good for 5.2 innings, but she just lost command," said Cotter. "With Lauren it comes down to the 'getting it' piece. Too many hit batters and walks, but she is close and that's the frustrating part."
A pair of errors in the third inning cost the River Hawks two runs as
Alisha Welch (Langley, British Columbia) dropped what would've been the final out of the inning on a liner by BU's
UMass Lowell finished their seven-game homestand with a record of 1-6.
Next, UMass Lowell will travel south to battle UMBC in a three-game series that starts with a doubleheader tomorrow at 1:45 at UMBC Softball Stadium.
