East Carolina University
BYU
BYU Defeats East Carolina at Red Desert Classic
February 07, 2014 | Softball
Feb. 7, 2014
ST. GEORGE, Utah - The East Carolina softball team suffered its first defeat of the season Friday afternoon in a 13-5 setback to tournament host BYU at the Red Desert Classic.
Starting pitcher Gabby Andino also led the offense in the game, going 2-for-3 at the plate with an RBI in her first appearance for the purple and gold.
BYU (2-2) took advantage of three first-inning walks issued by the Pirates' pitching staff and jumped out to an early 2-0 lead. The see-saw affair began when ECU tied the game in the top of the third inning on an RBI double by sophomore Meredith Mitchell, who came around to score on the same batted ball after a throwing error by an opposing outfielder.
The Cougars responded with a three-run bottom half of the inning to take a 5-2 advantage, but East Carolina (1-1) punched right back with three runs of its own in the top of the fourth.
The inning began with a leadoff double by infielder Alex Fieldhouse and a single up the middle by catcher Abby Wynne to put runners on the corners with no outs. First baseman Jordan Lewis hit a hot shot to the right side for an RBI single that moved Wynne to third. Following a pop out, Andino smoked an RBI single of her own to score Wynne. ECU picked up another run on a ball hit by Mitchell than resulted in a fielding error by BYU's first baseman to re-tie the game at five all.
Unfortunately for the Pirates, it was all Cougars from there on out, as they pushed across five runs in the bottom of the fourth inning, two in the fifth and a final score in the sixth with two outs to claim the eight-run victory by mercy rule.
Freshman Lydia Ritchie (0-1) took the loss, as Ashley Thompson (1-0) earned the win for BYU.
East Carolina will face Utah State at 1 p.m. (ET), and Southern Utah at 3:30 p.m., on day two of the tournament, Saturday, Feb. 8.
