Game #41 Box: PDF | HTML
Game #42 Box: PDF | HTML
Season Series Stats (PDF) | Photo Gallery (Mark Pieper)

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – Eastern Illinois softball picked up an Ohio Valley Conference split at Austin Peay on Friday, as the Panthers dropped a first-game heartbreaker, 3-2, in eight innings, but countered with a 7-2 rout in the nightcap.

Eastern improves to 33-9 overall and a continued first-place league standing at 20-3.

More importantly, the Panthers continued to up their school-record single-season home run mark to 43 as four different EIU hitters -- Melise Brown, Hailee Hanna, Kiley Holtz, and Carly Willert -- each nailed a bomb on the day.

Willert led Eastern at the plate on Friday, going 5-or-8 in the twinbill and earning eight total bases.  Hanna ended up with a 4-for-7 batting performance, as she joined Willert with an impressive 1.000 slug mark.

A total of seven Panthers earned at least one hit on the day, while Brown added two stolen bases to up her season base thefts to 14-of-20, while Maria Sorrentino and Willert also added a stolen base each.

The Panthers led the Lady Govs (11-34/6-17) in batting (.271 to .163), runs (16 to eight) RBI (nine to five), stolen bases (four to one) and fielding (zero errors to two for APSU).

The EIU pitching staff of Amber May and Stephanie Maday combined for 13 strikeouts, just three walks and a limited .163 batting average.

In the first game, Carly Willert nailed her sixth home run of the season, in solo fashion, to give the Panthers the early 1-0 lead in the first frame. Melise Brown then jacked her seventh bomb of 2011, and ninth of her career, as EIU suddenly led 2-0 in the third inning.

However, APSU would knot the score at two-all thanks to a two-run triple in the bottom of the fourth before the Lady Govs earned the upset win off a walk-off homer in the eighth.

The defeat marks only the second time all season that EIU failed to win a game after scoring in the opening frame, while falling to 29-4 for 2011 when scoring before the opposition.

Kiley Holtz and Hailee Hanna added two additional hits for the Panthers as both squads had four shots heading into the extra-inning thriller.

After earning 13 consecutive wins in OVC action, senior pitcher Amber May was tabbed with her first loss of the season as she retired seven APSU batters off strikes and allowed just one walk in the complete game defeat. The game-winning bomb by the Govs marks the ninth homer given up by May this season as she falls to 17-4 overall.

The first game loss and recent defeat at SEMO marks the first consecutive losses by the Panthers since late February when Eastern was 3-4 on the early season.

In the nightcap, the Panthers came out on a mission as EIU finished with 12-to-three advantage in total hits.

Eastern scored three runs in both the third and sixth frames as Kiley Holtz drilled a two-run homer to left center, plating Willert. The bomb was Holtz's fifth of her senior year as she upped her career mark to 19 homers.

Prior to Holtz's homer, Reynae Hutchinson earned a score via a sac fly RBI to bring home Melise Brown.

In the sixth inning, Brown ripped a two-run double, her seventh of the year, while Willert brought home Brown off her own RBI shot.

The Panthers enjoyed the six-point lead before the Govs were able to plate two runs off a home run of their own, but Hailee Hanna added to the Panther scoring with her own solo bomb in the seventh frame.

Freshman Stephanie Maday earned the complete-game win to improve to 13-4 on the year as she struck out six, allowed just two walks and limited APSU to just three hits.  She also limited the Govs to a low .125 batting mark in the win.

The rubber-game of the weekend OVC series is set for 1 pm on Saturday.

... for more info, contact Bart Rettberg, Asst. SID