Box Score
Ithaca, NY — There was most likely a point — or, perhaps, many points — where the Messiah softball team wondered if it would ever get the chance to play for an NCAA Regional Championship at Ithaca College.
Sitting on a bus for the better part of two days, the Falcons watched sheets of rain come down on the Bombers' Kostrinsky Field, first washing out all of Sunday's play and then putting Monday's action in serious doubt.
But, when play finally resumed late Monday on a muddy terrain, Messiah was more than ready.
It was then that the Falcons beat both Keuka College and the elements to claim the program's fourth regional title overall and second in the last three years, knocking out the Storm for the second time over the weekend by a 6-1 score. Messiah (39-5) ended without a loss in the double-elimination tournament, and advances to face DePauw University Friday at 4 p.m. to begin play in the 2011 NCAA Division III Softball Championships.
“It was good to finally play, and even better to win,” said Messiah head coach Amy Weaver, who has been at the helm in all four of the program's World Series appearances. “When we finally were told that we were going to play (Monday), our attitude was, 'Okay, we've been sitting around here, let's take care of business. Let's show everyone why we're the number one seed (in the regional) and show everybody who we are. And we did.”
Barely.
Originally slated to play the regional championship game at 2:30 p.m. Sunday, heavy rains and dense fog eventually pushed everything back to Monday — with game times slated for 10 a.m. and 12 noon.
More rain threw that contingency plan out the window, and it wasn't until 2:15 p.m. that Keuka and Ithaca finally took the field for the right to play Messiah in the title match.
The Storm and Bombers got six innings of play in before another round of heavy rain halted things, forcing the tarp to come back on the field in a 1-1 ballgame.
“It was at that point that I was beginning to think we weren't going to play at all,” Weaver said. “It was getting late, there's no lights up here and (NCAA rules state) we have to get the games in today — (by rule) we couldn't play (Tuesday).”
Thankfully, the skies broke just in time for Keuka (23-5-1) to stun the host Bombers by a 2-1 score in the bottom of the seventh inning, setting up a re-match of Saturday's tilt between the squads, an 8-0 Messiah win.
Monday's game was just more of the same.
After haphazardly taking infield and scurrying to begin the day's second game as quickly as possible, it took Messiah a few frames to get going. A single in the first and a single in the second failed to produce a run, leaving the door open for Keuka to potentially grab a lead.
Not that junior Jessica Rhoads would have anything to do with that.
Making her third pitching start in the Falcons' four-game weekend, Rhoads (15-1) was again brilliant, striking out seven while allowing just two hits in six innings tossed. The Storm placed just two runners on base over the first four innings, giving Messiah enough time to settle in.
The Falcons began their scoring in the third, where a leadoff single from junior Ashley Lehman was eventually plated by an RBI single from sophomore Stephanie Schell. Messiah tacked on two more in the fourth when Lehman tripled, driving home juniors Jessica Brown (who singled) and Abi Buchler (who walked).
Rhoads got additional insurance in the fifth frame, where three hits and a Keuka error brought two more across: Brown doubled down the line with one out retired, bringing home junior Jaclyn Merkel (who singled) and Rhoads (who reached on a fielder's choice).
Messiah concluded its scoring in the sixth inning, as back-to-back singles from Rhoads and Schell helped push across Lehman, who opened the inning with a lead-off walk.
In all, the Falcons rapped out 11 hits — nearly doubling their production from the first contest against the Storm.
“We did play well today,” Weaver said. “We hit the ball hard and we put it in play. Even when we made outs, we put it in play and made them make plays. We did that the entire weekend, really.”
What Messiah also did was shut opponents down, allowing a total of just four runs off of 11 hits in four regional games. Sophomore Jocelyn Hickey relieved Rhoads in the seventh inning of Monday's victory, giving up the lone run of the game on — of all things — an illegal pitch.
It did little to douse the post-game celebration, however, as Messiah had earned its fourth appearance in an NCAA Division III National Championship, joining runs in 2009, 1999 and 1998.
“Winning this (regional) was truly a team accomplishment in every sense of the word,” Weaver said. “Go back and look at the four games over this weekend, and you can count on two hands the number of girls who stepped up and did big things. It wasn't just one or two girls. It was everybody. And every day, it seemed like it was someone new doing it.”
Lehman, Brown and Schell led the way Monday, as Lehman knocked out the aforementioned, two-RBI triple while Brown finished 3-4 with a double and two RBI. Schell finished 3-4 from the plate with a pair of RBI as well, while Merkel went 2-3 with a run scored.
All four of those players were freshmen on Messiah's 2009 national championship team — as were Rhoads and Lauren Seneca — and Weaver said the junior class has eyed returning ever since.
“This was a goal of ours from day one, but especially for the juniors,” she said. “They've been here before and they've done it before, and they've wanted so badly to get back. It's a big accomplishment. We wanted to put ourselves in a position to play for a championship, and we've done that. Now we'll move on and see what we can do.”
Messiah will face DePauw (31-9-1) — which won the Adrian College Regional title behind a 4-1 record — Friday at 4 p.m. The Tigers averaged 9.5 runs per game over the regional weekend, and are making their second straight championship appearance — and third in five years.
“They're good every year,” Weaver said. “We haven't had a chance to look at them closely yet, but traditionally they're a very good hitting team and a scrappy team.”
The Messiah-DePauw match-up will be Friday's third game played at the 2011 NCAA Division III Championships, to be held at the Moyer Complex in Salem, Virginia. The eight-team, double-elimination championship tournament is slated to go through Monday, with a plausible Tuesday date, if necessary.
Check back to the Messiah softball schedule page for official site links, live video links and live stat links.
