Teams: Softball: Schedule & Results

COLLEGE SOFTBALL FINAL SCORE
NESCAC Tournament
Tufts 7, Williams 0

At Middletown, CT
Friday, May 2, 2008

Game Box Score

Christy Tinker's two-run homer gave the Jumbos an early lead

MIDDLETOWN, Conn. -- First-year pitcher Izzie Santone (Madison, CT) tossed six shutout innings, yielding just five hits, and junior Lauren Gelmetti (Westfield, NJ) worked out of her own jam in the seventh inning to preserve the shutout as Tufts, the defending NESCAC champs, captured a 7-0 decision over Williams in a first-round NESCAC tournament game.

Tufts will next meet Trinity, which beat Wesleyan in its first-round matchup, 7-0, in a winner's bracket contest Saturday, preceded by Wesleyan vs. Williams in an elimination game. Those game times have been moved up an hour due to impending weather. Tufts and Trinity are scheduled to start at 11:30 am.

Tufts scored in five of the six innings against Williams, taking the lead in the first inning when sophomore Christy Tinker (Woodbridge, CT) lined her eighth homer of the season over the fence in left field with junior Cara Hovhanessian (Farmington, CT) aboard. She had singled with two outs.

It became 3-0 in the second after senior co-captain Megan Cusick (Albany, NY) and junior Maya Ripecky (Chicago, IL) led off the inning with base hits. A grounder to first base by junior Roni Herbst (Montclair, NJ) moved the runners to second and third. Herbst was safe at first as the ball was misplayed by the Ephs. Junior Samantha Kuhles (Somerville, NJ) then hit a fly ball to left and Cusick beat the throw home to make it a sacrifice fly.

Kuhles added another sacrifice fly in the fourth to make it 4-0, and a two-run single by Cusick to center upped the margin to 6-0 in the fifth. The Jumbos added their final run in the sixth on an RBI single by Tinker, who finished the game with three hits along with Hovhanessian. Cusick finished 2 for 2 with 2 runs scored and 2 RBI.

During the regular season, Williams defeated Tufts, 7-6 in California. Tufts took two of three games vs. Trinity, winning 7-1 and 2-1, while also dropping a 5-2 decision. There will be at least three games played on Saturday as the winner of the contest between Wesleyan and Williams will take on the loser of the Tufts-Trinity game in the double-elimination format. Depending on the weather, a potential championship game might follow on Saturday with the winner of Trinity-Tufts taking on the winner of game 5. Games might be played on Sunday if necessary.

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