Friday the Lady Spartans played a very good Rochester Community and Technical College team and dropped game one 10-1 and lost game two 10-0. The Lady Spartans were overmatched at the plate as they were able to get only two hits in the first game and were no-hit in the second game. The Lady Spartans pitched and played pretty well for their first games in three weeks, making some fine defensive plays, but the bats were a little tardy against the hard throwing RCTC pitchers.

Saturday the Lady Spartans stayed right inside the bubble and played Riverland Community College from Austin, Minnesota. The Lady Spartans won game one 8-3 behind an outstanding pitching performance from Maddy Shjerve and some great defensive plays. The Lady Spartans put together a tremendous 7th inning rally to win game two 9-8.

In game one, Kenna Kehoe picked up a first inning RBI to give the Lady Spartans a 1-0 lead. Riverland tied the game 1-1 in the second and it stayed that way until Maddi Missling scored in the fourth for a 2-1 Lady Spartan lead. In the top of the fifth, the Lady Spartans finally strung together some good at bats scoring three runs on RBI base hits by Kehoe, Lydia Baker and Hannah Scherr. That gave the Lady Spartans a 5-1 lead. With the score 5-2 in the top of the 7th, the Lady Spartans put the game away with three runs. Kehoe drove in her third run of the game with a triple to right. Scherr plated Kehoe with a double and Maddi Missling drove Scherr in with her third hit of the game. Riverland scored once in the bottom of the 7th, but Shjerve shut the door for the 8-3 Lady Spartans win.

In game two, the Lady Spartans trailed Riverland 7-1 going into the final inning but batted 12 and scored 8 runs to take a 9-7 lead. The inning started with a Carly Fuentes single, Mikayla Geiser was hit by a pitch and Shjerve singled to load the bases. Kehoe and Baker followed with RBI base hits and Abby Tysdal had a great at bat to pick up a RBI on a walk. With one out Scherr picked up an RBI on a single to make the score 7-6.  Scherr stole second to put runners on second and third with two outs. Carly Fuentes delivered a two strike, two out, two run single to give the Lady Spartans an 8-7 lead. Fuentes stole second Geiser stroked a single to score Carly for a 9-7 lead.

Riverland didn’t quit as they scored a run in the bottom of the 7th and had runners on first and second with two outs and their leading hitter at the plate. She hit a scorching ground ball right down the third base line, but Lady Spartan third baseman Anissa Antonsen made a great play diving to her right and fielded the ball cleanly and landing right on top of the base for the force out and the final out of the game and a 9-8 Lady Spartan win.

The Lady Spartans will play St. Cloud Technical and Community College Tuesday at home. First pitch is 3:00.