Pitching carried the day for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga softball team Saturday, as the Lady Mocs completed a weekend Southern Conference sweep of Western Carolina.
The Lady Mocs managed to squeeze out just enough offense to win 2-0 and then 3-2 in 10 innings. That made them 9-0 in conference play, 26-9 overall.
Junior pitcher Nikki Waters started the first game by giving up a double to WCU center fielder Jordan Fulton, but that was the only hit she allowed the entire game. The former Soddy-Daisy star faced one batter over the minimum in seven innings, striking out nine batters and walking one.
Waters, in her first season at UTC after transferring from Southern Illinois, has struggled at times early in the season, and she said she’s been trying to regain her focus lately.
“It’s all mental. I’ve just had to get my head on straight and know that I’m going to go out there and do the best I can,” Waters said. “I’ve just been focusing on one pitch at a time, and take it from there.”
Pitching coach Shaina Ervin said she had challenged Waters to improve her perfomance lately.
“We had a pretty long talk the other day at practice about what was going on and how she had to have a more dominant approach instead of a more timid approach,” Ervin said. “I told her that the months of April and May are when we need to peak, and our team’s better when she’s on her game.”
With Waters shutting down the Catamounts (4-25, 0-11), the Lady Mocs scored the only run they would need in the first inning, when a Tia Blosser sacrifice fly brought home Lyndsey Stiles. Lauren Flores scored another run in the bottom of the sixth to wrap up the win.
In the second game, UTC jumped to an early 2-0 lead, but senior pitcher Brooke Loudermilk ran into trouble in the third inning and gave up a two-run double to WCU first baseman Colby Liles.
Loudermilk received a stern talking-to from Ervin after giving up the lead.
“I went out there to talk to her. I said, ‘At what point are you going to decide to get better? Because I can find somebody else that will do it,'” Ervin said. “You get to a point as a coach when you realize that you can do it for them, and they have to decide to do it.”
Ervin’s tough talk had the desired effect, as Loudermilk retired the next 13 batters.
“She was pretty mad, and I don’t like to disappoint anybody — especially our team,” Loudermilk said. “It was time to step up or get taken out, so I just tried to do what I was asked to do.”
UTC continued to struggle to score, however, stranding runners in the fourth through ninth innings. Finally, Blosser’s single in the 10th inning drove home Stiles, who started the inning on second base, to end the marathon game.
Lady Mocs coach Frank Reed said the offense will have to get better as they prepare to face legitimate SoCon contenders Georgia Southern and Elon the next two weekends.
“I don’t quite understand it. We’re facing pitchers with high ERAs and low strikeouts and we’re not getting it done,” Reed said. “Fortunately for us, we found a way, but at some point you’ve got to stop just finding a way and be dominant if that’s what you really expect from your team.”