GALESBURG, Ill. — First-year Chelsea McKee went 3-for-5 with a inside-the-park grand slam to key a 13-9 victory for the Knox College softball team in the first game of a doubleheader with Mount Mary University on Friday afternoon at Knox Softball Park. The visiting Blue Angels (6-19) rebounded to take game two, 6-4, from the Prairie Fire (2-29).
Trailing 5-1 in the fifth inning, McKee got things rolling for Knox with an RBI triple. By the time she came to bat again, the bases were loaded and she lined a ball into the right-field corner. The throw went toward second base and McKee kept steaming around third and beat the throw to the plate, capping a nine-run outburst and giving Knox a 10-5 lead. It was the first home run of McKee's career and the first by a Prairie Fire player this season.
After Mount Mary got a two-run double by Amanda Nance in the sixth, Knox responded by loading the bases with nobody out and eventually scored all three runners for a six-run lead at 13-7. Lily Day brought home two more Blue Angel runs in the seventh with a three-bagger, but McKee made sure that was all they would get by making a spectacular diving catch in center to end the contest.
Sophomore Janet Lentini (1-4) went the distance for her first win of the year, surrendering nine runs on 15 hits and three walks to go with three strikeouts. McKee wasn't the only Prairie Fire player with three hits as first-year Lauren O'Neill rapped out a pair of singles and a double, scoring three runs and plating another. Lentini also helped her own cause at the plate driving in two runs, joining junior Taylor Goudschaal and senior Maddie Poetzinger with two RBIs apiece.
Taylor Hames (2-11) was saddled with the loss for yielding eight runs on eight hits and two walks over 4.1 frames in the circle. Every starter in the Mount Mary lineup had at least one hit, led by Kylie Ann Kluck with three knocks.
All the scoring in the second game was done by the top of the third. The Blue Angels roughed up fifth-year Londyn Nelson (1-12) in the first for four runs, only one of which was earned.
But Knox battled back, scoring twice in each of the first two innings to drawn even at four apiece. McKee got things started with a lead-off double, and eventually Back-to-back grounders to second off the bats of fifth-year Haylee Carpenter and first-year Brenlie Bartlett cut the deficit in half. In the second, the first Prairie Fire run scored on an error, and junior Maddie Hicks hit a sacrifice fly to tie the game.
Jodie Penman stroked a two-run single in the third for Mount Mary, and the pitchers took over from there. Knox reliever Charlie Davison clipped the wings of the Blue Angels with four shutout stanzas, while Day (2-4) held the Fire scoreless for the final five frames in her route-going performance. Day allowed four runs, two earned, on six hits and one walk over seven innings to earn the victory.
Knox will travel to local rival Monmouth College (4-28, 0-10) for a doubleheader on Saturday beginning at 1 p.m. Both games will be streamed live with stats available, courtesy of Monmouth, through PrairieFire.Knox.edu, the official website of Knox Athletics.
