By Zoë Woodward – Spear Reporter | Freshman pitcher Norah Coulsell being encouraged by her teammates. Photo by Marilyn Anye (@_marilynbride) – Spear Photographer.
San Jose State softball (14-30, 6-15 MW) are now level in its final home series of the season after an 8-0 defeat to the New Mexico Lobos on Saturday (23-24, 10-11 MW).
As rain unexpectedly started to fall at the start of the second inning, the Lobos scored the first runs of the game to begin their triumph.
It would soon become apparent that the game would be decided there as the Lobos would go on to score all eight of their runs in that single inning.
Despite the Spartans starting the inning strong, it would take them too long to find the last out.
With two outs already on the board, they only needed one more out to end the inning with no runs on the board.
“It seemed like forever to get that final out,” SJSU head coach Tammy Lohmann said. “We gave them too much of a beginning. One day you show up, one day you don’t show up but you have got to have all aspects of the game.”
Once a run was on the board, the Lobos were unstoppable at the plate.
In an attempt to slow them down, junior pitcher Jordyn Fray was swapped out for freshman pitcher Norah Coulsell. However, it didn’t appear to make a difference.
“The first couple of innings were obviously a hard way to start out any game,” senior utility Shay McDowell said. “It was just the difference in being intentional with our energy, being able to come back from something like that rather than letting it set the tone for the rest of the day.”
Just when it felt things couldn’t get any worse for the Spartans, Lobos sophomore infielder Miracle McKenzie struck the ball deep to left field and over the fence to score a home run to make the score, 8-0.
Despite performing so well on Friday and earning a 8-2 victory, it appeared the Spartans weren’t up to the challenge the following day.
“I think we can just take our energy from yesterday,” senior infielder Reina Zermeno said. “We need to really channel that, be super intentional with our warmups and how we show up and just jump on them early.”
Heading into the final home game of the season, the Spartans have been left with a lot to think about if they want to win this conference matchup.
“We had every ability to be able to get back into that game,” Lohmann said. “We’re taking too many pitches, getting behind in counts, we’re not attacking the zone, not getting the ball in play. They have to come out and compete tomorrow. They have to show up with a mindset of laying everything on the line, let’s play for our three seniors.”
The final game of this series will start at noon on Sunday at the Spartans Softball Complex.
