Pitchers strong for UTC

Pitching ruled the day for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga softball team Thursday as the Southern Conference softball tournament opened. The offense did just enough to get the Lady Mocs two wins.

UTC began with a 2-1 win over Western Carolina, but coach Frank Reed wasn’t happy after the Lady Mocs committed two errors and were unable to score after two first-inning runs. They beat Furman 2-0 Thursday night.

“They didn’t come ready to play,” Reed said after the first game. “This effort won’t win the tournament. ... This particular game, we gave a halfway effort and it was enough to win.”

The Lady Mocs scored their only runs when Lyndsey Stiles led off with a single and scored on a Catamounts error on a Michelle Fuzzard single. Senior third baseman Toni Hutchison brought Fuzzard home from third base with a single to right field.

Stiles, who was 2-for-2 in that game, said the Lady Mocs weren’t focused early, and it could have cost them.

“In this conference anybody can beat anybody at any time,” Stiles said Thursday night. “Underdogs beat the top seeds today, and the No. 2 seed (College of Charleston) is going home. That goes to show you that you’ve got to bring your A game every time.”

As lackluster as the UTC offense was, the pitching was stellar. Lady Mocs ace Brooke Loudermilk allowed only one unearned run in four strong innings with seven strikeouts against WCU, and Fuzzard finished for her first save of the season. Both Loudermilk and Fuzzard were coming off injuries late in the season.

Loudermilk kept up her strong work against Furman, and UTC played a better game behind her. She went 5 1/3 innings against the Paladins and gave up three hits while striking out six batters.

“Going into this thing, we were worried about pitching,” Reed said. “We were worried about Brooke and we were worried about Michelle and if they would get to pitch or not. We didn’t know if (Loudermilk) would get to pitch, but she did and then gets 13 strikeouts.”

Loudermilk was confident the UTC pitching would be there in the tournament.

“I told Coach Reed a couple of weeks ago when he was worried about our pitching,” Loudermilk said. “I said, ‘Don’t worry about it. In the conference tournament, we’ll be there.’ It’s all about proving yourself, and I think that’s what we had to do.”

Again the Lady Mocs struggled to score runs. Tiffany Baker had an RBI single in the fourth inning, and pinch hitter Tia Blosser added a key insurance run with an RBI single in the top of the seventh.

After Loudermilk gave up a one-out double in the sixth inning, Reed brought in Kandice Irwin, who was perfect over 1 2/3 innings to finish out the game and earn her first save of the season.

While pleased with his strong pitching, Reed knows the Lady Mocs will have to find a way to score more runs as the tournament continues today against Samford at 3 p.m.

“We’re going to try to focus on continuing to get our good pitching and try to put some more runs on the board,” Reed said. “We’ve got to get those hitters back in tune, and I think tomorrow they will be.”