(Photo: Marlee Smith/WCSN)
In their return to Farrington Stadium to host the Sun Devil Classic, No. 15 Arizona State split the opening doubleheader of the tournament, handling Princeton in a dominant 20-5 outing, but falling to No. 9 Texas by a score of 11-4.
In the first game of the day against Princeton, ASU’s offense was the story. Every ASU starter recorded at least one hit on the day, which provided many incredible performances to pick and choose from.
Out of the four home runs the Sun Devils hit in the first game, sophomore DeNae Chatman provided two, including a grand slam in the bottom of the fourth to put ASU up to the game’s final score of 20-5.
“(Chatman) is fun to watch, she’s got a lot of power,” ASU coach Trisha Ford said. “She’s somebody who’s going to continue to get better,”
Chatman’s fifth and sixth homers of the year were accompanied by solo shots from sophomore second baseman Bella Loomis and junior catcher Maddi Hackbarth.
“I think we have done a really good job sticking to our plans and making sure we are seeing our pitch and making sure we are swinging at our pitch,” senior outfielder Morgan Howe said.
Redshirt junior Cielo Meza started in the circle for the Sun Devils but was relieved by freshman Mikayla Santa Cruz after giving up four free passes to the Tigers and walking in a run with the bases loaded two-thirds of the way through the first inning.
Santa Cruz pitched nearly three innings for the Sun Devils and did not give up a hit until the fourth, where she began to struggle. The freshman gave up three hits and four earned runs in the fourth and was eventually replaced by ASU’s junior ace, Samantha Mejia.
Mejia corralled the Tigers’ efforts to come back, commanding the rubber just as she has done all season long, earning her eighth victory of the season.
After a quick turnaround, ASU faced a far more formidable challenger, a team with five WCWS appearances and rich history in the pitching circle, the No. 9 team in the nation, the Texas Longhorns.
ASU sent freshman Abby Andersen to the circle to pitch her second start against a team ranked in the top 10. Andersen looked strong through the first, retiring all three batters she faced. However, the gradual bleeding started in the second and didn’t seem to stop throughout the contest.
Texas scored a run in the second inning on a single hit up the middle. The Longhorns then exploded for a five-run third inning where a pair of singles and a three-run double put the score at 6-0. In the fourth UT continued to pour on the offense and Andersen continued to struggle, yielding back-to-back home runs to the Longhorns, putting the score at 9-2.
Meza relieved Andersen in the top of the fifth. Andersen exited the game after pitching four innings, giving up 10 hits and six earned runs.
“Abby has been great for us, she’s still a freshman and hopefully we can learn from this,” Ford said. “She just wasn’t herself today and it was just ‘one of those days. We just have to go back to the drawing board.”
Meza finished the game for ASU, really only struggling in the top of the seventh when she gave up three consecutive base hits to the high-powered Texas lineup.
The Sun Devils offense went from firing on all cylinders to sputtering against Texas’ ace pitcher and former Oregon Duck Miranda Elish. While Elish looked vulnerable to the Sun Devil bats at times, her only major mistake came in the bottom of the third when Howe took her deep to left center for a two-run bomb. Elish caught her stride with two consecutive strikeouts to end the inning.
She would pitch the entire game for Texas, only allowing five hits and striking out every Sun Devil starter at least once for a total of 14. She also hit in the eight-hole of the batting lineup, providing four RBIs on the day with the aforementioned second-inning single and third-inning three-run double in the 11-4 UT victory.
Moving forward for ASU, rather than move on to a plethora of other opponents as they have in their recent tournaments, ASU has the privilege of facing Princeton and Texas again during the rest Sun Devil Classic on Saturday and Sunday.
“I think (playing Princeton and Texas again) is getting us ready for conference,” Ford said. “It’s a good opportunity and we will learn from it… I think we just have to keep getting better and execute some pitches and I think things look a little different.”
ASU faces off against Princeton and Wisconsin in another doubleheader on Saturday to continue the Sun Devil Classic. Their rematch with Texas will be on Sunday.
