Lion Women's Softball Drops Pair on Day Two Against New Kensington

Pittsburgh, Pa. - Through the second day of a Penn State University Athletic Conference weekend, the Penn State Greater Allegheny women's softball team dropped two games to Penn State New Kensington, Saturday afternoon, by margins of 10-3 and 14-5.

New Ken got on the board first in game one before the bottom of the first inning rolled around. Freshman second baseman Michaela Henderson (Bowie, Md./Bullis School) singled to get on base before freshman third baseman Raeann Sleith (North Huntingdon, Pa./Norwin) tripled to score her. With a freshman catcher Sydney Fritchman (Carnegie, Pa./Carlynton) single, GA took the lead 2-1.

The visitors complied three runs in the third inning and two runs in the fifth to go back on top, 6-2.

The Lions managed to score Hailey Maksin to advance their tally one more before NK tacked on four more runs in the top of the seventh. NK came out on top, 10-3 heading into the next set of seven innings.

Fritchman hit 3-of-4 while senior outfielder Shelby Bendick (White Oak, Pa./McKeesport) laid down 2-of-4.

Freshman pitcher Lacie Lautner (Pleasant Hills, Pa./Thomas Jefferson) threw all seven innings while facing 35 batters, sitting five down on strikeouts.

Game two started in a back-and-forth battle. New Kensington put up three in the top of the first before Greater Allegheny matched those three. Fritchman and freshman third baseman Raeann Sleith (North Huntingdon, Pa./Norwin) singled to bring home Bendick and Henderson. Sleith was the third to cross home plate.

Two runs in the second and one in each of the third and fourth innings led to the New Kensington slide.

Sleith added another in the third as Bendick hammered a homerun to bring the score to a 7-5 NK. A landslide of seven runs added in the sixth inning resulted in a hole the Lions could not dig out of, dropping the second contest 14-5.

Freshman pitcher Savannah Simm (West Mifflin, Pa./West Mifflin) threw six innings for the blue-and-white, sitting down four of her 41 batters faced. Bendick hit 2-of-2 with two runs scored and one RBI while Sleith connected for 2-of-3 with two runs and one run batted in.

Greater Allegheny (2-6, 1-3 PSUAC) looks forward to their next Penn State University Athletic Conference (PSUAC) as the ladies travel to Penn State DuBois, Friday, for a 7 p.m. double-header.