The softball team's four-loss weekend will serve as a bitter pill that acts like a vitamin. At first, it'll taste disgusting. But give it a few weeks, and it'll do this team a whole lot of good.
Now in their second year as a varsity team, the softball team (now 5-8 overall) dropped their two-game home-opener to the University of Hartford Hawks, 4-1 and 6-2, at Sachem Field on Saturday. On day two, the Big Green fell to the University of Rhode Island Rams, 10-5 and 4-1, late Sunday afternoon.
"In the end, we came up a bit short," Christina Maybaum '98 said. "But we'll look at our mistakes and learn from them. That's how we'll improve."
For starters, Dartmouth is looking to become a little sharper at the plate. In the weekend opener, the Big Green was caught swinging 15 times against Hartford's pitching ace, Danielle Simoneau.
Lauren McQuade '97 led the Big Green with two back-to-back doubles. On her second trip to second, McQuade sent DH Liz Teutsch '99 across the plate for Dartmouth's only run in the first game.
Laura Mills '00, who threw a no-hitter last weekend, started with four shutout innings and didn't give up a single earned run.
Four hits and a throwing error helped the Hawks advance to a 5-1 lead in the fifth inning.
In the second game, a comedy of errors kept the Big Green from putting up the numbers as a walk, an infield throwing error, a hit batter, a wild pitch and a missed grounder allowed the Hawks to take a four-run lead off just one hit.
On Sunday, Dartmouth put up a stronger fight before being buried by crushing rallies by the Rams.
In game one, the Big Green bounced to a 3-0 lead before Rhode Island scored five runs in the third off five consecutive hits. The Rams added two more runs in the bottom of the fourth.
In the second match, Dartmouth again took the lead in the first inning. But the Rams rally struck hard and fast in the third as Rhode Island drove in three runs.
Despite the win-less weekend, Maybaum is confident that the team is on the road to improvement. "We're happy with where we are right now," Maybaum said. "We just need to pull together and fix a few things with our game."
"We have two more doubleheaders before we start into league play, and I think they're going to let us iron out our kinks so we'll be in great shape to take on Brown and Yale," Ayn Huntington '00 said.
