Courtesy of Penn State Athletics
COLLEGE STATION, Texas – A wild back and forth contest between Penn State and No. 22 Texas A&M ended with a Blue and White celebration Saturday night, as the Nittany Lions upset the Aggies 4-3 in eight innings on their home field.
PSU was aided by the suddenly familiar clutch arm of Marlaina Laubach (Northampton, Pa.) who entered the contest with two outs in the bottom of the first, with the bases loaded and the Aggies up 2-0, threatening to break the game wide open.
Laubach, like she had done in her team’s 6-1 win over Missouri State earlier in the day, made quick work of the opposition, inducing a fly ball to left to end the early A&M threat.
That rally stopper loomed large as it set the stage for a Penn State rally of its own in the third, when head coach Amanda Lehotak saw her team plate three runs to take a 3-2 lead.
The Lions knocked out TAMU starter Katie Marks after just two and two thirds following a bases loaded walk to Macy Jones (Asburn, Va.), a fielder’s choice off the bat of Alyssa VanDerveer (Hillsborough, N.J.), which scored a run and a long RBI single off the center field wall by Kristina Brackpool (Valenica, Calif.).
The lead would not last for long though as A&M tacked on another run in the bottom half of the third to tie it at 3-3 following a walk and a throwing error by the Lions in the field.
Ironically enough even though the home standing Aggies had plated three runs on Penn State pitching, they had done so without mustering a hit off of starter Marissa Diescher (Livingston Manor, N.Y.) or the reliever, Laubach. All had been as a result of either walks or errors but Texas A&M broke up the combined no-hit bid in the fifth with a lead-off single to right off of the bat of right fielder Cali Lanphear.
Laubach did not allow another hit the rest of the way as she shut down an Aggie attempt at a walk-off in the bottom of the seventh, following back-to-back two out walks.
She got A&M first baseman Reagan Boenker to pop out to the circle to end the threat and send the game to extra innings, Penn State’s first since an 8-7 eight inning loss at Indiana (Apr. 13, 2014).
Because of the international tie-break rule, the Lions began the top of the eighth with a runner (VanDerveer) on second and no one out. After a ground out and a foul fly to start the inning, PSU mounted a two-out rally that would eventually give them the game and the upset.
Leftfielder Erin Pond reached on an error by the Texas A&M first basemen who dropped a throw from the Aggie infield following a ground ball. That miscue allowed VanDerveer to hustle around third and slide into home with the go ahead run.
In the bottom of the eighth, Laubach recorded the first out on a liner to short and then the second on a pop out to short, following a one out walk. She then struck out A&M centerfielder Erica Russell looking with runners on first and second to secure her team’s first win over a ranked opponent since Feb. 17, 2014, when the Lions defeated No. 21 LSU, also on its home turf.
Following the called third strike, Laubach threw her glove up in the air and raced toward her catcher, VanDerveer. The Blue and White battery was quickly met by a swarm of their elated teammates in the ensuing celebration.
In relief Laubach picked up her second win of the young season in a matter of two days goes to a perfect (2-0), while PSU out scored and out hit (6-1) their SEC foes despite committing three errors to their lone miscue. It was Laubach’s longest outing of the year following a pair of two inning stints in which she worked out of bases loaded and two on and no one out jams.
With the perfect 2-0 day on Day No. 2 of the Aggie Classic, Penn State moves to 6-3 on the season and is off to its best start in six seasons. The last time the Lions were 6-3 after nine games was back in 2010 when the team went 9-3 out of the gate.
PSU will next take on Eastern Michigan, Sunday morning in College Station. First pitch is scheduled for 11 a.m. Eastern at the Aggie Softball Complex.
