WINTER HAVEN, Fla. (3/15/15) - Pitchers Stephanie Gilbert and Courtney Yard led the No. 12 Kean University softball team to a pair of 4-1 victories over Springfield College and SUNY Cortland on Sunday at the Rebel Spring Games. Both hurlers allowed just one run over seven innings of work.
In the top of the first against Springfield, Kean loaded the bases thanks to a pair of hit batters sandwiched around a bunt single by Emily Sabo. With the bases full and two outs, MacKenzie Valeriani worked a seven-pitch walk to force in the game's first run.
With the bases still chucked, fellow freshman Katie Garbarino – in her first college plate appearance - lifted a two-RBI single into right-centerfield to make the score 3-0 Cougars after half an inning.
In the second, Camdyn Morgillo launched a homer over the leftfield fence to get one run back for Springfield.
Morgillo, who was also the pitcher for the Pride, worked around some trouble over the next three innings. Two runners reached in the second, Emily Bissonnette led off the third with a double and Cayleen Rizo doubled to the wall in the fourth, but the Cougars stranded them all. By the time the game reached the fifth inning, Sabo was already 3-for-3 in the game but the team had not been able to score again.
Cougar starter Stephanie Gilbert was throwing well. Aside from the solo homer, she allowed just three singles over the first five innings.
Tonianne DeMatteo began the Kean sixth inning with a hard single through the left side, and Brooke Ennis sacrificed her to second. Yard drove the run in with a scalding liner off the third baseman's glove to net the final Kean run of the game.
Gilbert wiggled out of a bases-loaded, no-out jam in the home half of the sixth. She induced two grounders to Sabo at short, who fired home to Garbarino (pictured left) at the plate to prevent the runners from scoring. One more bouncer to Rizo at third base ended the inning with no damage done.
Gilbert stranded another runner at third in the seventh to earn the complete-game victory. The senior scattered seven hits in seven innings, with two strikeouts and just two walks. It took her just 83 pitches to get through the contest.
In the second game against Cortland, the first four Cougars reached base. Rizo and Sabo singled, Yard walked and then MacKenzie Valeriani lined a single down the leftfield line to drive in two. But Red Dragon pitcher Jamie Lachall stiffened up and kept the score 2-0 after one.
In fact, Lachall went on to match Kean starter Courtney Yard zero-for-zero over the first three innings.
In the top of the fourth, Cortland scratched across an unearned run with a single, stolen base, error and a productive groundout, cutting the lead to 2-1.
Apart from that unearned run, Yard was dominant for the second-straight day. She tossed a complete-game two-hitter and struck out eight while walking just one Dragon. She threw 93 pitches; 57 were strikes.
In the sixth, she provided herself with some insurance by leading off the frame with a single through the left side. She then scampered home as the result of three different wild pitches with the Cougars' third run. Later in the inning, Valeriani walked and was driven home by Bissonnette for the final tally.
Yard finished up her outstanding pitching performance with a 1-2-3 seventh as Kean improved its record to 3-1 this season with the second-day sweep.
The Cougars will have a day off before resuming their Florida trip with games against Skidmore College and Eastern Connecticut State University on Tuesday.
