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Roos softball captures Sunrise Conference regular season championship

Posted 4/24/11

(Canton, N.Y.)- The SUNY Canton women’s softball team captured the Sunrise Conference regular season championship for the second year in a row with a pair of hard-fought and dramatic wins over the …

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Roos softball captures Sunrise Conference regular season championship

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(Canton, N.Y.)- The SUNY Canton women’s softball team captured the Sunrise Conference regular season championship for the second year in a row with a pair of hard-fought and dramatic wins over the University of Maine at Presque Isle on Sunday.  The Roos won 3-2 and 11-10.

Lyndsay Coppola (Lindenhurst, N.Y.) blasted a home run in each game and Emiley Walters (Lancaster, N.Y.) and Vickie Lynch (Howard Beach, N.Y.) each delivered game-winning hits to lead the Roos to their 10th win in their last 11 outings.  The Roos are now 10-0 in the Sunrise Conference and 15-13 overall and have secured the top seed in the conference tournament next weekend at Regis College in Weston, Mass. where they’ll defend their championship won a year ago.  The Owls were dealt their first conference losses as they fell to 8-2 in league play and 12-11 overall.

“These were two very well played games by both teams,” said SUNY Canton head coach Diane Para.  “UMPI is a very good team and they deserve great credit for fighting as hard as they did after losing their starting pitcher in the first game.  I thought our left side of Vickie, Lyndsay and Heather had really good defensive outings today.  We had a couple of very timely hits from Emiley and Vickie that helped seal two  hard fought wins.  It was great softball and fortunately the end went our way.”

The two teams were scheduled to play a third game on Sunday after being rained out on Saturday, but after SUNY Canton clinched the title in the second game, they decided not to play the third contest.

A raucous crowd was treated to a pair of entertaining and well-played contests that saw numerous and outstanding defensive and offensive plays, as well as a beautiful afternoon with temperatures climbing into the mid-50s.

The first game ended in dramatic fashion thanks to the bat of Walters.  Coppola staked the Roos to a 2-0 lead with an RBI- single in the second inning that plated Tina DeLuca (Fresh Meadows, N.Y.), who had also singled, and a solo home run in the fourth inning that sailed over the left-field fence. 

The Owls fought their way back with one run in the fifth inning and another in the top of the seventh inning that each resulted from a pair of errors by the Roos. 

In the bottom of the seventh, Colleen Rivers (Bay Shore, N.Y.) laced a one-out single to center field and Barbara Gonzalez (New York, N.Y.) entered the game to pinch run.  After the Owls retired the next batter on a fly ball to center, Walters stepped up and blasted a 2-2 pitch off the fence in center field for a walk-off, RBI –double that scored the speedy Gonzalez from first.

Walters added a single in the game and DeLuca notched the win on the mound holding the Owls to four hits and three walks in seven innings.

The error bug bit both teams in the second game as they combined for nine miscues in the contest. 

Coppola went deep for the second time on Sunday putting the Roos ahead 2-0 after belting a two-run shot to left in the bottom of the second that scored Carolina Olivares (Adelanto, Calif.), who led off the inning with a double.  Coppola now has eight home runs this season and Olivares notched her team-leading 13th double.

Presque Isle came back in the next stanza to put up five runs resulting from four errors by SUNY Canton.

The Roos re-grouped with a five-run bottom half of the inning to regain the lead at 7-5.  DeLuca had a two-run single, Lynch smacked an RBI-single and the two other runs came off Presque Isle errors.

The lead swung back to the favor of the visitors when they scored three runs in the top of the fourth inning thanks to a solo home run by Brittany Humphrey and a two-run double from Emily Moore.

But once again the Roos had an answer and a solo home run by Heather Lottie (Canton, N.Y.), her fourth of the year, deadlocked the score at 8-8.  Lynch came up big again in the bottom of the fifth inning after the Owls had gone back ahead 9-8.  Jenifer Shaw (Helendale, Calif.) tied the game with an RBI-single and then Lynch ripped a two-run single that would prove to be the game-winning runs. 

Jessica Measheaw (Hammond, N.Y.) started the game on the mound and struck out two batters and allowed seven hits and two walks in four innings.  DeLuca had two strikeouts and gave up five hits and one walk in three innings.

Walters, Shaw, Lynch, Olivares, and Coppola each collected two hits in the second game.

Humphrey and Kathleen Higgins each had three hits on the day for the Owls.  Moore took both losses on the mound as she as she gave up five hits in game one in relief and 13 hits in the second game.  She had three total strikeouts.