HANOVER — In a weekend that included a no-hitter and a pair of walk-offs, the Dartmouth College softball team completed a three-game sweep of Brown to stay very much alive for a trip to the Ivy League championship series.
Senior left-hander Brooke Plonka no-hit the Bears in Saturday’s 3-1 victory, giving up an unearned run on a throwing error in the third inning. She struck out 11 and walked just two for her second career no-no and the eighth in program history. Senior Billie McFayden drove in all three runs for Dartmouth (12-20, 6-3 Ivy League) on a first-inning solo home run and a fifth-inning two-run single.
McFayden was far from done providing heroics for the weekend. In Sunday’s first game, she hit a game-tying solo shot in the seventh before the Big Green won it, 5-4, on an error in extra innings. Freshman right-hander Rachel McCarroll got the win in relief.
Dartmouth finished off the sweep later Sunday with a dramatic, 9-7 comeback win. Trailing by five in the fourth, the Big Green started chipping away with key run-scoring hits by junior shortstop Kate Farren and freshmen outfielders Alaana Panu and Jenna Brown. Still down by one entering the seventh, Dartmouth plated the tying run on a throwing error, then Brown’s two-run blast to left put an end to the proceedings.
The Big Green will put their seven-game winning streak on the line this weekend at Penn.
NEW HAVEN, Conn. — It was a hot and cold weekend for the Big Green’s offense, but fortunately for them, the bats were hot in two of their three games against the Bulldogs.
Dartmouth (12-13, 5-4 Ivy League) put up eight runs in the first three innings en route to a 14-4 victory in Saturday’s first game. Sophomore infielder Tyler Cox’s spectacular season continued with a four-hit game, including a three-run home run, and senior Justin Murray also went deep.
The Bulldogs evened the series with a 5-1 win later Saturday as the Big Green managed just three hits, avoiding the shutout in the ninth on a sacrifice fly by junior Kolton Freeman. But Dartmouth cruised again in the rubber match, scoring five in the first and never looking back in a 11-4 win.
The Big Green did not hit a homer in that outburst, but they pounded out 16 hits, with Murray, junior Connor Bertsch and senior Kade Kretzschmar each collecting three. Murray got the win on the mound as well, pitching into the eighth and giving up four runs.
Dartmouth heads to Albany for a midweek game on Wednesday, then hosts last-place Princeton this weekend.
HANOVER — The Big Green (3-7, 1-3 Ivy League) cruised over the Lions for their first Ivy League win on Saturday afternoon at Scully-Fahey Field.
Dartmouth led, 9-2, after the first quarter and kept the pressure on from there, led by seven goals apiece from junior Katie Elders and freshman Katina Christensen. Elders is tied for second in the Ivy League with 30 goals on the season.
Freshman Maja Desmond had three ground balls and two caused turnovers, and was named Ivy League Defensive Player of the Week.
The Big Green put 27 shots on goal to Columbia’s 15, and had a 21-10 edge in draw controls. Dartmouth is at No. 12 Princeton this Saturday.
HANOVER — Dartmouth (7-9, 1-2 Ivy League) split a pair of 4-3 matches this weekend at the Boss Tennis Center, losing to the Big Red on Saturday and defeating the Lions on Sunday.
The Big Green won the doubles point against Cornell, with the No. 2 team of juniors Ashley Hess and Chidimma Okpara and the No. 3 team of sophomore Lexi Dewire and junior Emily Zhou emerging victorious. But singles wins from Hess and freshman Elizabeth Fahrmeier weren’t quite enough.
The following afternoon, Dartmouth again took the doubles point, and this time the Big Green had just enough success in singles to pull out the match over Columbia. Zhou, Okpara and Fahrmeier each won their matches, with Fahrmeier’s three-set win at the No. 4 spot clinching the overall victory.
The Big Green will hit the road this weekend, heading to Penn on Saturday and Princeton on Sunday.
The Big Green (8-9, 0-3 Ivy League) could muster just one point in a pair of losses to Cornell and No. 23 Columbia this weekend.
Freshman Alex Knox-Jones gave them that point against the Big Red on Saturday with a commanding 6-4, 6-0 win at No. 4 singles, but Dartmouth failed to take a set elsewhere. The next day, the Big Green lost every set against the Lions, with junior Anders Gibbons taking his opponent to a first-set tiebreak at No. 1 singles.
Dartmouth hosts Penn and Princeton this weekend.