PURCHASE, N.Y. – Making a long-awaited home debut, the Manhattanville University softball team extended its winning streak up to nine games with a doubleheader sweep of Mount Saint Mary on Sunday. The Valiants outscored the Knights 15-0 in the two games and improve to 9-7 overall while climbing to 4-0 in the Skyline Conference.
Game One Recap: Manhattanville 7, Mount Saint Mary 0
A complete game shutout by
Charli Shinstine (Encinitas, Calif./San Dieguito Academy) coupled with a three RBI effort from
Sarah Harker (Irvine, Calif./Irvine) led the Valiants to the win in Sunday's opener.
Shinstine had her strongest outing of the season so far as she was effective in holding the Knights' bats silent. The graduate hurled a complete seven innings, allowing just two hits and a pair of walks while striking out a season-high 10 batters. Following a tough stretch of open up the season, Shinstine has gone 4-0 in her last four appearances, pitching 22 straight scoreless innings in that span. Her ERA has fallen to 3.80 for the season.
At the plate, the Valiants scored runs in four separate innings to secure the win. After Shinstine retired the side in order in the top of the first, the Valiants scored a pair in the bottom half.
Olivia Fasce (Yorktown Heights, N.Y./Yorktown) and
Samantha Walsh (Spring City, Pa./Owen J Roberts) drew back-to-back walks and both advanced on a wild pitch during Harker's first at-bat of the day. The graduate outfielder delivered with the opening salvo, finding a hole on the left side to score Fasce. Pitch location continued to plague Mount Saint Mary's Bridget Morris as she issued a free pass to
Amaya Esparza (San Diego, Calif./Granite Hills) to load of the bases before
Rachel Coleman (Lake Forest, Calif./Mission Viejo) drew the team's fourth walk of the inning to put Manhattanville up 2-0.
Manhattanville tacked on three more in the third. Walsh led off with a single and advanced two bases on a wild pitch. Harker delivered again with a double to center to plate the third run and came across to score herself on Esparza's RBI single. Three batters later,
Samantha Reyer (Oceanside, N.Y./Oceanside) beat out an infield single to plate Coleman to extend the Valiant lead up to 5-0.
The Valiants added a run in both the fourth and sixth to secure the win. Esparza scored Walsh with an RBI single in the fourth while Harker legged out her second RBI double of the contest in the sixth, scoring Fasce.
The Knights were held without a hit until the fourth inning and would not get a runner past first base in the opener.
Harker finished 3-for-4 in the first half of the day's action, joined by Walsh and Esparza with multihit games. Fasce and
Juliana Parkes (Victoria, British Columbia, Canada/Belmont Secondary) each stole a base in the win.
Game Two Recap: Manhattanville 8, Mount Saint Mary 0 (Six Innings)
Another strong pitching performance, this time from
Emily Mottoshiski (Craryville, N.Y./Taconic Hills), blanked the Knights for the second time on the day while Esparza had four RBI, highlighted by a walk-off three-run single in the sixth, as the Valiants earned their fifth run rule victory of the season.
Like Shinstine before her, Mottoshiski had her strongest start of the season to pick up her first complete game shutout of 2024. The junior pitcher scattered six hits across her six innings in the circle as she did not issue a single walk and struck out three. The outing lowers her season ERA to 4.97.
Manhattanville plated a run in each of the first two innings before erupting for a six-run sixth to activate the run rule. Fasce led off the bottom of the first with a bunt single and advanced up to third on a pair of outs. With two away, Esparza delivered her first strike of the game with a double to right to score the junior center fielder.
An inning later,
Alexa Lazur (Carlsbad, Calif./La Costa Canyon) drew a leadoff walk ahead of stealing second base to put herself in scoring position.
Isabella Tansey (San Diego, Calif./University City) brought her home with a single to double the Valiant lead to 2-0.
The big inning in the sixth was fueled by four hits and one Knight error, with all the runs scoring with two outs. With a pair in scoring position, Tansey rolled over one to the right side. The sophomore booked it out of the box, resulting in the throw by the Knights' third baseman to be off line. Parkes and Coleman both scored runs on the error, opening up the floodgates. Tansey scored one batter later on Fasce's single to right before a Walsh single and Harker walk loaded up the bases for Esparza to end the game with her three-run single.
Fasce, Esparza, Coleman and Tansey all had two hits in the win. Tansey joined Esparza in the extra basehit column with her first double of the season.
Madison Gonzales (Azusa, Calif./Sacred Heart) stole a base in a pinchrunning appearance.
Up Next
The Valiants return to play on Thursday for a non-conference doubleheader at William Paterson. First pitch against the Pioneers is scheduled for 3 p.m.
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