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Box Score 2 EUNICE, La. – LSU Eunice Softball ended the home portion of the 2023 regular season with a Saturday split at Lady Bengal Field. The Bengals welcomed Blinn College and Pearl River Community College for a three-team round robin.
LSUE honored its nine sophomores following the completion of the day's triple header.
The Bengals started the day with a bang, walking off Blinn College in a 4-3 thriller. LSUE would suffer a 14-6 setback against Pearl River to close the day's action.
Game 1 vs. Blinn College – W, 4-3
LSU Eunice fought until the end, using a bunt to drive in the game winning run over Blinn College, taking the 4-3 victory.
It was a classic pitching duel for
Chloe Bennett (Rosepine, LA, Rosepine HS) against the Buccaneers. It was a scoreless game for the first three innings before Blinn would score first on back-to-back two out hits in the fourth inning.
The Bengals would answer right back as
Gracie Bailey (Watson, LA, Live Oak HS) and
Gabrielle Huetter (Magnolia, TX, Magnolia HS) drove in runs on back-to-back two out hits of their own. Bailey helped LSUE take a short-lived lead in the sixth, singling home
Taylor Palmer (Zachary, LA, Zachary HS) to make it 3-2 LSUE.
Bailey collected two of the team's four hits to lead the LSUE offense.
Blinn had an answer as two straight doubles brought in the game tying run in the seventh. Bennett would retire the next three batters to send it to LSUE's final at bat.
Bennett tossed her 13th complete game of the season to improve to 21-5 on the season. She would scatter three runs, one of them earned, off six hits and a walk. The sophomore ace struck out seven batters in her final home game as a Bengal.
Rylie Tate (Columbia, LA, Caldwell Parish HS) drew a full count walk to open the seventh inning and would advance to second base on a sacrifice bunt by
Sara Roussel (Luling, LA, Hahnville HS).
Maci Baldwin (Moss Bluff, LA, Sam Houston HS) sent the dugout into a frenzy after a bunt down the third base side was thrown wide, allowing Tate to score.
Game 2 vs. Pearl River CC – L, 6-14
A defensive lapse loomed large for LSU Eunice as Pearl River would walk away with a 14-6 decision to close out the day's action. The Bengals allowed just three earned runs, while gifting the Wildcats seven errors on the game.
It was an offensive shootout early as the two sides traded punches the first four innings. LSUE would light up the scoreboard first as
Abby Touchet (Shreveport, LA, C.E. Byrd HS) ripped a two-out double in the first inning. Both teams scratched three run frames in the second as LSUE produced three RBI singles from
Skylar Cheek (Ponchatoula, LA, Ponchatoula HS), Maci Baldwin and
Madison Prejean (Lafayette, LA, St. Thomas More HS).
The offense continued in the fourth as the Wildcats pushed ahead 6-4 on another three-run inning, only to be answered by a two-run home run by Prejean.
That's when things went sideways for the Bengals. After a one out error but the first base runner of the fifth inning on, LSUE would commit four more errors in the inning as not one of the Wildcats' eight runs were earned.
LSUE would try to stave off a run-rule with two on and two outs but a lineout to the outfield would end the game.
