Chattanooga, Tenn. – Chattanooga plated eight unearned runs over the first two innings en route to an 11-3 Southern Conference softball victory over Furman in the regular season finale for both teams Sunday afternoon at Frost Stadium.
With the victory, Chattanooga completed a three-games series sweep of the Paladins and improved to 22-27-1 overall and 10-11 in the SoCon. Furman finished the regular season at 13-39 overall and 5-16 in league play. The Paladins will be the No. 8 seed in this week's SoCon Softball Championship and will face No. 5 seed Chattanooga in a 10 a.m. opening round game on Wednesday at Frost Stadium in Chattanooga, Tenn. The game will be streamed live on ESPN+. Links for the live stream and live statistics are available online at FurmanPaladins.com.
The Mocs loaded the bases in the bottom of the first inning with the benefit of just one hit in grabbed the lead on Jade Gainer's free pass. Chloe Lackey cleared the bases with a three-run double to center field and Raven Jones drove in Lackey on an infield single to stake Chattanooga to a 5-0 advantage.
Back-to-back singles and a sacrifice fly by Baileigh Pitts began the bottom of the second for the Mocs before consecutive errors on the infield opened the door for three more Chattanooga runs to score, highlighted by Gainer's two-run double and a bases loaded walk issued to Zoe Wright.
Furman responded with three runs in the top of the fifth as
Kate Stoltzfus plated
Meghan Shirey with an RBI single and
AB Cipalla drove in two runs with a base hit, but Chattanooga answered with two more in the bottom of the frame to end the game by the eight-run mercy rule.
Emery Bales (8-9), who allowed three runs on five hits over three innings of relief, earned the victory for the Mocs. Furman starter
Jamison Noonan absorbed the loss after surrendering eight runs on five hits in 1.1 innings in the circle. Just one of the runs allowed by Noonan was earned.
Gainer and Lackey each doubled and combined to drive in seven of the Mocs' 11 runs in the series finale. Cipalla finished 2-for-3 with two RBI for the Paladins.
Long limited Furman to just two hits and fanned six Paladins in a complete game effort to power the Mocs to a 9-0, six-inning victory in game one of the weekend series.
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