Friday's (Jan. 31) 2025 season-opener already wasn't a garden variety one for Ashland University's softball team – starting a campaign before the calendar turned to February.
In the Eagles' first game at the Music City Invitational in Nashville, Tenn., however, they earned a 3-1 win over No. 3-ranked Indianapolis to get the new year going. And in doing so, first-year AU head coach
Jackie Price earned her first win for her new team, as well as her 200
th victory as a collegiate head softball coach.
To end the day, the Eagles routed Missouri-St. Louis in five innings, 13-4, to begin a season 2-0 for the first time since 2019.
In the bottom of the third inning of the season opener vs. the Greyhounds, two Indy errors on the same play allowed two Eagle runs to score and put AU ahead.
An RBI triple in the top of the fifth cut the Greyhounds deficit in half at 2-1, but a strikeout by senior pitcher
Bryn Grabowski and a lineout double play kept Ashland in the lead.
Grabowski then did another Houdini act in the top of the sixth. After Indy put runners on second and third with no outs, she induced a foul out, a lineout and a strikeout to end the threat.
Ashland got an insurance run in the bottom of the sixth, when sophomore pinch-hitter
Kate Kujawski collected an RBI single with two outs.
Errors helped the Eagles jump on UMSL in the second game of the day, as two Tritons miscues led to a 1-0 AU lead after a half-inning. Kujawski had the RBI in her at-bat where the second error occurred.
Missouri-St. Louis, however, came back with a single run in the bottom of the first to re-tie the game at 1.
Then, in the top of the third, senior designated player
Cassidy Shaffer's single and two-base UMSL error plated Ashland's second run of the game, and Kujawski came through in the next at-bat with a sacrifice fly for a 3-1 AU advantage.
The Tritons responded once again in the bottom of the third with two runs to knot the game again, this time at 3-3.
Following a lengthy weather delay, the Eagles went back to work. In the top of the fourth, junior second baseman
Danielle Robbins was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded to give AU the lead back at 4-3, then an RBI single by Shaffer and other UMSL error on the same play got two more Eagles runs across.
Later in the frame, Kujawski collected her third RBI of the game and fourth of the day on a single, senior catcher
Rachel Reuter added a run-scoring safety, and sophomore shortstop
Sophia Smithnosky walked with the bags packed. That all came before before sophomore third baseman
Sophia Martin cleared the bases with a triple to finish the nine-spot and put Ashland up 12-3.
The Tritons scored a run in the bottom of the fourth, then Smithnosky's RBI double in the top of the fifth restored AU's nine-run lead.
GRABOWSKI GROUND OUT A W…AND THE REST OF THE STORY
- Grabowski went the distance on a four-hitter, striking out eight and walking five.
- Ashland earned its first win over the Greyhounds in 16 years on Friday afternoon.
- In the win vs. UMSL, Shaffer was 3-for-4 with two runs scored and an RBI, and Martin finished 2-for-3 with a run scored and three RBIs.
- Junior pitcher Delaney Lis (1-0) yielded seven hits, four runs (three earned) and a walk and struck out four in five innings.
UP NEXT
The second and final day of the Music City Invitational on Saturday (Feb. 1) vs. McKendree at 11:30 a.m. (10:30 a.m. Central) and Illinois Springfield at 1 p.m. (noon Central).
