The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga softball team overcame a six-run deficit in the first game but could not repeat that feat Saturday against Mercer at Frost Stadium.
UTC won 10-9 and lost 8-2 in the Southern Conference doubleheader. The teams play again at 2 p.m. today.
The Mocs (25-22, 5-6) went ahead 3-1 in the series opener on Amanda Beltran’s three-run home run in the second inning, but Mercer scored four runs in each of its next two at-bats and led 9-3 before the hosts started their comeback. In the bottom of the fifth, Jordan Fortel batted in Criket Blanco and scored on a sacrifice fly by Amanda Ross, and an inning later the Mocs scored five runs – three on a Ross double.
“Amanda has been playing really well. I’m excited for her, especially since she’s a senior,” UTC coach Frank Reed said in a school release. “It was a great comeback in the first game, but we have to use that momentum to push forward.”
The momentum continued with Blanco hitting her fifth homer of the season in the first inning and the Mocs carrying that 1-0 lead into the sixth, when Quirisa Mauga blasted a three-run homer for the Bears. She added another homer in the five-run seventh, and UTC bookended the scoring with an Anyssa Robles homer in the bottom of the seventh.