Marshall Softball battled and won all six of its contests in the Marshall March Madness Invitational tournament weekend.
“It’s good to be in front of our home crowd,” coach Zerkle said. “It wasn’t our best offensive day, but we had some big swings in there which made the difference in the ballgame. Our defense was great, pitching held us tight and fun for our home crowd to see the squad this year.”
Catcher Abby Darnley hit her team-leading fourth home run while going 10-for-19 on hits for the Invitational.
Outfielder Kasia Parks also 10 hits in each of the six contests.
On Friday, March 7, the Herd played a double header against the Loyola University Chicago Ramblers and the University at Buffalo Bulls.
The Herd defeated the Ramblers 9-1 in five innings to start the Invitational with Parks and Infielder Ramey George each hitting their first-career collegiate home runs.
Marshall only needed two innings to do damage, scoring six runs in the bottom of the third and three runs in the bottom of the fifth inning.
In the second game of the day, the Herd defeated the Bulls in the battle of the bovines in a close 3-2 win. The game featured nearly identical stat lines, with both teams having six hits and one error each.
Jules King struck out 10 batters, with five of her punchouts ending an inning.
King’s most valuable strikeout came to end the game with the potential game-tying run standing on third base.
On Saturday, the Herd won two more games, once again defeating the Valparaiso University Beacons 13-5 before shutting out Valparaiso 5-0 to keep on the four-game win streak.
Marshall had an explosive game against Valparaiso, scoring 13 runs on 15 hits throughout the five-inning match, while having another dominant performance against the Bulls, scoring nine runs on 13 hits.
The Herd finished the weekend sweep on Sunday with a 13-5 win against the Ramblers again and a 5-0 shutout against the Beacons.
The Herd starts Sun Belt Conference play on Friday, March 14, against the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns at Dot Hicks Field with the first pitch at 6 p.m.
Nate Harrah can be contacted at [email protected]
