March 17, 2002

Pittsburgh Box Score
Jacksonville State Box Score
Birmingham Southern Box Score
Gardner-Webb Box Score

ROCK HILL, S.C.- Rain cancelled the final day of the Winthrop Invitational, before Southeast Missouri State had the chance to improve their record at the weekend event. Southeast did manage a Saturday afternoon victory over Gardner-Webb and lost games to Pittsburgh, who won Pool A at the tournament, Jacksonville State and Birmingham-Southern.

Below are recaps from each game.

March 15 - vs. Pittsburgh (L, 5-4)

Southeast opened play at the Winthrop Tournament against Big East foe Pittsburgh, who would eventually win Pool A after rain cancelled Sunday's bracket play. Both teams came out of the dugouts on fire, both scoring three times in the first inning. Pitt would add two more run in the third inning but the Otahkians could manage only one in the fourth, as they fell for the seventh time in eight games this season.

March 15 - vs. - vs. Jacksonville State (L, 3-1)

SS Dawn Piantino started the game off in style, hitting a homerun on the first pitch of the game. The homerun was the first of her career at Southeast. Unfortunatley for the Otahkians, they would not score again. JSU added single runs in the second, third and fifth innings to pull out the 3-1 victory. Freshman Kelly Birk started the game for Southeast, lasting three innings and allowing two runs, one earned, on four hits. Senior Kristen King came into the game in relief of Birk, allowing four hits and a run.

March 16 - vs. Birmingham Southern (L, 7-1)

Coming off two losses, Southeast opened Saturday morning's play by scorin in the first inning when Reagan Hamlin fielder's choice groundout scored SS Dawn Piantino who started the inning with a single to center. Altough Piantino would have a great day (3-4 with two singles and a double) and the team managed seven hits, Southeast would not score again.

BSC (7-24) playing in their 31st game of the season, scored twice in both the third and fourth innings, one of the six and added two more insurance runs in the seventh. An error by Southeast pitcher Kristen King allowed BSC to score their first two runs, and timely hitting the rest of the way added to Birmingham's explosive. They had 12 hits on the day.

March 16 - vs. Gardner-Webb (W, 8-1)

After dropping their first three games at Winthrop, Southeast closed the tournament in style. Michelle Lunsford scored in the second inning on a sacrifice bunt to get the scoring started. After Gardner-Webb tied it at 1-1 in the bottom of the second, the Otahkians exploded for four runs in the top of the third. A two RBI single by Kemi Rampi and sacrifice flies by Brooke Nett and Reagan Hamlin accounted for SEMO's run.

With the game in hand, sophomore Amy Thompson blasted a two-run homerun, her first hit of the season. She is the second Otahkian, Alicia Loucks being the other, to hit a homer for their first hit of the season. Freshman Rachel Van Fleet (2-2) pitched a complete game to pick up her second victory of the season. She allowed seven hits over seven innings.

Southeast (2-9) will next travel to the College of Charleston to battle C of C on Tuesday in a 1:00 p.m. doubleheader.