USD softball struggles vs LMU

Defensive mistakes and a lack of timely hitting undo Toreros at home

Anderson Haigler | Sports Editor | The USD Vista

At times this weekend, it seemed like the Toreros were their own worst enemy. Though the weekend contained bright spots, the University of San Diego softball team’s conference series against Loyola Marymount University was for the most part characterized by the Toreros’ lapses on defense, and an inability to capitalize with runners on base. This somewhat overshadowed several positive notes for USD. 

Heading into the series, just four games separated the overall records of the first-place Lions and fourth-place Toreros in West Coast Conference (WCC) standings. The gap between the two squads, however, seemed to be more glaring than the standings suggested this past Saturday and Sunday at the USD Softball Complex.

The series began with perhaps the Toreros’ best-played game of the three. LMU quickly jumped out to an early, 2-0 lead over USD behind a single, a double, and a fielding error by junior centerfielder Taylor Spence. This sequence would lead to an early pitching change for the Toreros, and in the top of the fourth inning, USD softball head coach Melissa McElvain looked to right-hander Hannah Boos to take over for sophomore starter Delaney Heller. After surrendering an RBI single from Madison Flores, the first-year settled in for 4 1/3 innings of relief, largely keeping the Lions at bay for the next three innings.

While Boos was busy keeping LMU off the board, Lions pitcher Hannah Bandimere was doing the same for her own team, surrendering just one hit through the first three innings of play. In the bottom of the fourth inning, however, the Toreros seemed to break through and figure things out on offense. A double from senior Kailey Hill got things started for USD, followed by a single from sophomore Lindsay Clare. 

Junior Lauren Kane kept things moving with a two-RBI triple to deep right field, and the Toreros plated their first runs of the day. Kane’s triple brought the score to 3-2 Lions, and set the table for sophomore Madison Caisano to tie the game with a sacrifice fly to center. After four innings of play, the Toreros had tied the game at three. 

The next three frames saw both teams quiet down a bit on offense. The Lions had a chance to break the tie in the seventh after a double and a sacrifice bunt, but first-year shortstop Katie Vretzos threw out the would-be go-ahead run at home after fielding a hard ground ball. The game remained tied heading into the seventh. In the last frame of regulation, the Toreros threatened with a single from Caisano that would have represented the winning run for the Toreros, but junior pinch runner Kaity Coleman was caught stealing second base, and the rally sputtered out. Ultimately, seven innings wouldn’t be enough to decide the first game of the series, and the contest headed to extra innings. 

Extra innings, however, saw Boos run into trouble. The first-year surrendered four runs on two hits, walking two in the process. 

Though she was unable to close things out for USD, Boos turned in a solid effort out of the bullpen prior to the eighth, and McElvain stated she was appreciative of Boos’ effort in the pitcher’s circle.

“We have a young pitching staff,“ McElvain said. “Hannah Boos, she’s not used to the relief role, we’ve been using her more as a starter, but to see her come in that relief situation and shut it down, that was good to see, especially in a different role.”

Complicating matters in the inning, and likely contributing to the amount of runs LMU scored, were issues with the sun for Katie Vretzos at shortstop. She appeared to completely lose two pop flies in the sun, which was positioned directly overhead during the first game. 

One fly ball was deemed an infield fly and the other resulted in an additional two runs scoring. Neither was scored as an error.  Vretzos, who at the time was not wearing sunglasses, failed to make any contact with either of the pop flies. At the end of the eighth inning of play, LMU led by four runs. The Toreros went down in order in the bottom of the eighth, and lost the first game of the series by a 7-3 margin that belied the Toreros’ gritty performance for the majority of the game. 

Despite the Toreros’ late-inning woes in the opening contest of the series, McElvain said that she liked her team’s persistence and composure in the game.

“We don’t ever give up — we have good fight on our team,” McElvain said. “It’s just that we need to work on the execution side a little bit. We came back and tied it at 3-3, and we gave ourselves a chance to see what we could do, and we just didn’t finish. But it was good fight, and that’s been typical of our team all year. I am proud of that. Our team works hard, they try to stay in the game, they try to make something happen.”

The final two games of the series, however, were not played as competitively for USD. In game two of Saturday’s doubleheader, first-year starting pitcher Halle Kyler was touched up for four earned runs on six hits across just 3 2/3 innings of work. The Lions continued their offensive attack throughout the game on their way to putting up nine total runs. Offensively, USD couldn’t put anything together, and dropped a 9-2 decision in which they were outhit 15-6. 

On Sunday, the third game of the series saw early blunders on defense doom the Toreros from the get-go. Though Boos and Heller set forth a strong effort on the mound, combining to not allow any earned runs across seven innings pitched, poor defense behind them allowed the Lions to put up six runs in the game. 

The Toreros had their chances to get back into the game, but were unable to capitalize on baserunners offensively, ultimately leaving 10 runners on base, and losing by a final score of 6-0. After the game and the conclusion of the series, McElvain spoke about her team’s overall performance.

“I think we pitched a little better (on Sunday),” McElvain said. “We gave up 20 hits yesterday in the two games, so for our pitchers to come in today and adjust to the umpire’s strike zone and to limit them to seven hits, I thought that was a big improvement. The defense is really what let us down today; it just dug us a hole. I think all six runs were unearned. And so we make four errors in the first 2 1/3 innings — that’s a big hole to come back from, to ask your pitchers to throw that much more, to have that kind of hole for our offense. We just gotta clean up our defense.”

McElvain addressed possible causes for the team’s defensive mistakes.

“We have some players in different positions — we have an injury in the infield, so we kind of had to switch our infielders up a little bit,” McElvain said. “At a tough position like shortstop, it probably has something to do with it, but what we just talked about as a team is that we’ve been throwing people at different positions all season, and so I think we can adapt to that. I just think we’ve gotta be tougher.”

With just one week remaining in the Toreros’ 2018 season, McElvain explained the team’s mindset as they prepare for a home conference series against Brigham Young University (BYU). 

“We have one week left, and I want us to keep improving,” McElvain said. “I want us to keep getting better and that’s really what I think our focus is gonna be on (next week), is cleaning up the defense and playing more to our potential. I think we just have to compete, execute and compete.” 

McElvain stated that both teams have something to play for in their upcoming series.

“We’re in a position where we want to finish strong, and BYU is a position where they want to win a championship.” McElvain said. “I care about how we finish, and so even if we only have three games left this season, four practices, I want us to go all out, for every pitch and every practice and every game. And just put our heart out here on the field. We’ve worked hard all year, and I want to finish that way.” 

The Toreros begin their final series of 2018 this Friday at 6 p.m.