Despite picking up its first win of the year, Georgetown (1-8) ultimately struggled this weekend at the Georgia State Panther Invitational, placing fourth in the four-team tournament.
After dropping their opening game to Lipscomb 3-0 on Saturday, the Hoyas rallied to notch a 2-1 victory against host Georgia State. Trailing 1-0 entering the bottom of the seventh, junior Samantha Peters led off the comeback with the team’s first home run of the season, knotting the game at one apiece. After freshman Cara Savarese followed Peters with a single to left center, junior Suria Bahadue reached on an error to advance Jadig Garcia, who had come on to pinch-run for Savarese, to third. Sophomore McKinley Cooper then capped the rally with a walk-off single to right field, driving in Garcia to give Georgetown the final 2-1 edge.
“Winning felt great,” Peters, the 2008 All-Independent Player of the Year, told reporters. “I felt like [after the home run] it was our game. It turned the momentum around.”
The experience of the Hoya upperclassmen proved essential in the win. In addition to Peters’ and Cooper’s performances, junior pitcher Jennifer Connell had a brilliant showing, allowing only one run in seven innings pitched.
“We have a wonderful group of upperclassmen. They are true leaders and have done a great job of embracing the personalities and skills of our newcomers,” Head Coach Pat Conlan wrote in an e-mail.
The next game, however, the Hoyas were struck with a taste of their own medicine, as the Blue and Gray fell victim to a late-inning comeback by Eastern Kentucky. Just like in the Georgia State game, Georgetown saved its offensive firepower for the later stages of the contest. After being shutout in the first five innings, sophomore Kristi Preuss hit a two-run homer to give the Hoyas a two-run advantage. The Colonels responded emphatically with a three-run dinger in the next inning, giving Eastern Kentucky the final 3-2 advantage.
Freshman Mackensey Carter took the loss, allowing one earned run and eight hits in seven innings pitched. Despite leading the team in ERA at an impressive 1.86, Carter remains winless in four starts, three of which were complete games. For the Hoyas to attain any level of success this year, Carter’s performances must be complemented with some degree of run support.
The loss set up a rematch with the Colonels in the tournament’s consolation game, a game which ended in an eerily similar result to their first encounter. After a solo home run from Carter in the fourth and a sixth inning home run from Peters, Georgetown jumped out to a 2-0 lead, poised and ready to capture the consolation prize. The Hoyas again faltered in the late innings, however, allowing Eastern Kentucky to once again rally with three runs, this time in the bottom of the sixth. Georgetown was unable to respond in the top half of the seventh, giving Eastern Kentucky a narrow 3-2 victory.
Although the Hoyas ended the weekend with a 1-3 record (1-8 overall), Coach Conlan was generally satisfied with her team’s performance, as they remained competitive throughout the tournament.
“The difference in weekends was like night and day,” Conlan wrote, referring to the previous week’s showing in Miami, Fla. “While the outcomes were not always in our favor this past weekend, I thought the team played the way we are capable of playing. We had better energy, we were more competitive and overall we were just a much more solid team.”
With two highly competitive tournaments under their belts, the Hoyas may not boast an impressive record, but they have gathered the toughness and experience necessary for the Big East schedule that awaits them.
“We have built a schedule that will allow us to compete against very good teams from all over the country and who compete in many different conferences,” Conlan wrote. “Playing top competition early, even in a loss, will only help us when we begin conference play.”
Georgetown returns to action this weekend, as the team travels to North Carolina to partake in the UNC-Greensboro Tournament.
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