LEWISBURG, PA ‘ Junior second baseman Natalie Rawson (Palmdale, CA) had one of the most productive days in ¸Ô±¾ÊÓƵ softball history Tuesday to lead the Raiders (25-7 overall, 7-1 Patriot League) to a doubleheader sweep over Bucknell, 10-6 and 14-4.'xml:namespace prefix = o ns = 'urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office' />
This was a makeup date after last Sunday’s originally scheduled games were rained out.
In the second game against the Bison, Rawson hit a school record three home runs and drove in a school record nine runs. She had a solo homer in the third inning, before adding a grand slam in the fourth inning and a three-run homer in the fifth. She also had a RBI sacrifice fly in the first inning.
Rawson, who was 4-for-6 in the doubleheader with 11 RBI, is third in career RBI with 98.
Dorothy Donaldson (Lakeland, FL) was 2-for-3 including a triple and pair of RBI, while Rachel Smith (Annandale, VA), Erin Hanna (Tucson, AZ) and Bri Tsukamoto (Honolulu, HI) each added a pair of hits in the second game.
Sophomore Kate Howard (Wheaton, IL) pitched a complete game for the Raiders to pick her seventh win of the season. She scattered eight hits, walked two and struck out four.
In the opener, ¸Ô±¾ÊÓƵ jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the first inning on Donaldson’s RBI single. After Bucknell scored a pair of runs in the bottom half of the frame, the Raiders tied the game 2-2 in the third inning on Nichole Rawson’s (Palmdale, CA) single up the middle.
The Bison recaptured the lead 4-2 in the fourth inning, but ¸Ô±¾ÊÓƵ exploded for six runs in the fifth. Natalie Rawson had a two-run single, while Hanna had a RBI double and Tsukamoto had a RBI single.
¸Ô±¾ÊÓƵ added two more runs in the seventh inning on a throwing error by the Bison.
Senior Elena Isaac (Chandler, AZ) was the winning pitcher for the Raiders picking up her 12th win of the season. She worked the first four innings allowing seven hits, walking none and striking out three. Her three strikeouts moved her into second place in career K’s with 267.
Freshman Kelsey Nordstrom (Salina, KS) worked the final three innings to earn her second save of the season. She gave up two hits, walked two and struck out four.
GAME NOTES: Freshman first baseman Danielle Soule (Glendale, CA) didn’t travel with the team because of academic commitments ‘ Hanna’s double in the opener was the first extra base hit of her career ‘ Natalie Rawson has moved into 8th place in runs scored with 76 ‘ Donaldson moved into 5th place in runs scored with 83, 7th place in hits (135), and 4th place in RBI with 87.