UNION, N.J. (4/2/15) – Senior pitcher Courtney Yard of the No. 24 Kean University softball team hurled a perfect game in an 8-0 victory over Centenary College on Thursday. She struck out nine Cyclones in her five flawless innings of work.
It is the second perfect game in Kean school history. Yard also owns the other one, 366 days ago on April 1, 2014 against New Jersey City University at Cougar Field. It is the sixth no-hitter overall for the Cougars; Yard has fully half of them when her no-hitter against what was then known as Richard Stockton College in 2013 is counted.
The perfect game was scoreless until Kean loaded the bases with a hit and two walks in the third inning. MacKenzie Valeriani knocked a single that drove in two and fellow freshman Kayla Parker followed that up with another RBI base knock that made the score 3-0.
Yard (pictured left) continued to deal through the fourth inning. She struck out eight of the first nine Cyclone batters in her first time through the order.
Freshman Lexi Oakley earned her first college hit with a single to the wall in left-centerfield that sparked the final rally for Kean in the fourth. Cayleen Rizo was hit by a pitch before sophomore Emily Bissonnette launched her first career homerun into the leftfield alley to blow the game open.
Two batters later, after a Valeriani single, Parker blasted her first career homer to nearly the same spot to provide the magic eight-run cushion in a hurry.
With those two big flies, suddenly all Yard had to do was get three more outs to earn a perfect game via the eight-run rule.
In the final frame, Yard got a grounder to Rizo at shortstop for the first out, took care of a grounder back to the box herself for the second, and punched out the final hitter of the game to cement her perfect performance.
Every perfect game needs a little defensive help to happen. With only six Cyclones making contact, perhaps unsurprisingly this one came on a strikeout. Way back in the first inning, Yard struck out her third batter on a wild pitch that reached the backstop. Parker – the catcher – hopped up, retrieved the ball and fired to first to get the runner and keep the perfect bid alive, though no one could have recognized it at the time.
In the second game, Cougar starter Stephanie Gilbert followed with another five-inning shutout as Kean topped the Cyclones 10-0. Gilbert (pictured right) scattered five hits and struck out a career-high four batters as she earned the first shutout of her career.
Kean's bats were silent again for the first two innings but then exploded for six runs in the third and four in the fourth. Valeriani parked her second homerun of the season in the leftfield batting cages in the second game, and seven different Cougars had at least one hit.
Rizo, Bissonnette and Parker were all 2-for-3 in second game; Bissonnette finished with three RBIs and two runs scored in game two alone. Brooke Ennis had a double in the third inning that was the only other extra-basehit for Kean. Lena Buccigrossi also made her collegiate debut during the contest.
The Cougars will return to NJAC action against Rutgers-Camden in a road Saturday doubleheader.
