UNION, N.J. (5/16/15) – The Kean University softball team rallied to win the 2015 NCAA Division III Softball Union Super Regional in a deciding game three 4-2 on Saturday over Wheaton (Mass.) College. Earlier in the day, The Lyons had topped Kean 8-0 to force a winner-take-all third game of the series.
Senior Pitcher Courtney Yard (pictrued left with fellow seniors Alexis D'Aloisio and Stephanie Gilbert)earned both wins for the Cougars and was named the Most Outstanding Pitcher of the Union Super Regional. The Most Outstanding Player, sophomore Emily Sabo, was 4-for-6 in the tournament and had an on-base percentage of .800 while slugging 1.167.
Kean will advance to the 2015 NCAA Division III Softball Championship at the Moyer Sports Complex in Salem, Virginia. The first game of the national eight-team tournament will be against the University of Texas-Tyler on Thursday, May 21.
Click here to see video of the World Series-clinching out!
This is Kean's first trip to the NCAA College World Series since the 1986 team ended its season there with a 38-9 record. Prior to today, it marked the program's only appearance at the NCAA final site.
Game Three
Yard returned to the circle after starting game two and tossed a 1-2-3 first inning. She then led off the home half of the first with a ground ball single up the middle. A wild pitch got her to second, and Sabo (pictured right) beat out a bunt single to get her to third with nobody out. Cleanup hitter MacKenzie Valeriani lofted a fly ball to right just deep enough to allow Yard to score and give Kean a 1-0 lead after one full inning.
Amanda Berezny and Brooke Ennis had infield singles to start the second for the Cougars, but Wheaton shortstop Mary DeMaura turned a line-drive double play off the bat of Yard to end the inning. Tonianne DeMatteo also knocked a line drive right at a Lyon defender in the frame.
Kean pushed across one more run in the third. Sabo led off with a walk and Emily Bissonnette bunted her over to second. Valeriani singled to move Sabo to third, and Katie Garbarino brought home the run on a ground ball as the Cougars again played small ball to take a 2-0 lead.
Yard stayed perfect though five full innings. In the fourth frame, Sabo caught a line drive far to her left for the third out, after Yard knocked down a linedrive in the circle and recovered in time to throw out the runner in the two best chances for Wheaton baserunners in the first five innings.
In the home half of the fifth, Sabo walked to lead off and Bissonnette did a great job on a bunt-and-slash to pull the ball through the left side for a single. Sabo scampered home on a wild pitch and Garbarino laced an RBI single up the middle that made the score 4-0 after five.
All told, Yard retired the first 17 batters she faced before DeMaura hit a clean two-out single to break up the perfect game. But Yard induced a grounder to Sabo at second to end the sixth there and preserve the shutout.
Wheaton never gave up, and rallied for two runs in the seventh. The Lyons brought the game-tying run to the plate with two outs, but Yard forced a ground ball to Berezny at third base to end the game and send Kean to its first World Series appearance in nearly three decades.
Garbarino had two of Kean's three RBIs in the final game, and seven different Cougars had hits in the game. Yard threw 154 pitches over the two games on Saturday and finished with seven total strikeouts.
Click here to see a postgame interview with Sabo, Yard and head coach Margie Acker.
Game Two
Wheaton's Caroline Fairbanks got the day's first hit in the bottom half of the second inning with a long single off the leftfield wall. With one out, the Lyons sent a ball down the rightfield line. With a less speedy second baseman, it may have gone for extra bases. But instead, Sabo made a running catch down the line and doubled up Fairbanks, who had taken off thinking that the ball was sure to fall.
Over the first three innings, the only other runners in the game had come via bases on balls. Sabo and Valeriani had worked walks for the Cougars and Erin Deneen had drawn a walk for Wheaton.
Sabo earned Kean's first hit leading off the fourth when she pushed a bunt through the left side of the Lyon defense.
Wheaton broke through in the fourth after 10 scoreless innings against Kean pitcher Courtney Yard. Maddie Hatch, Morgan Walsh, Fairbanks, Emily Bouthillette and Marissa Timoteo posted five consecutive hits in the frame as the Lyons took a 4-0 lead.
The Cougars attempted to answer with their best rally in the top of the fifth. Cayleen Rizo doubled off the top of the leftfield wall to lead off the inning and DeMatteo singled in the inning, but Kean could not bring them around to score on Lyon starter Noelle Christmas.
The Lyons tacked on one final run in the sixth inning to reach the eight-run plateau and end the game early via the run-rule. The victory forced the winner-take-all third game.
Wheaton ends its season with a 34-10 record. Kean will take its 30-13-1 record into the NCAA Chmapionship site.
