Box Score

FORT MYERS, Fla. – The Nichols College softball team suffered a 5-0 setback at the hands at Ohio Wesleyan at the Gene Cusic Collegiate Classic Friday afternoon at the Lee County Sports Complex.

Junior Emalee Watkins (Malden, Mass.) and freshman Colleen Guthrie (Hamden, Conn.) each recorded one hit for the Bison (1-1) while sophomore Taylor Ferrazzi (Ashland, Mass.)  struck out five batters over six innings of work.

Senior Lauren Elkins (Johnstown, Ohio), sophomore Chelsea Denman (Pendleton, Ind.), and freshman Sarah Flint (Westerville, Ohio) each had an RBI for the Battling Bishops (6-2), who rebounded from a loss to Nichols' Commonwealth Coast Conference (CCC) rival Curry earlier in the day to earn their sixth win of the season.

Leading 1-0 in the third, Denman's sac bunt brought in junior Erica Bryan (Wapakoneta, Ohio) from third to push the lead to 2-0. Freshman Jessica Goodman (Lexington, Ohio) led off the fourth with a single and scored on an error to make it 3-0, and Flint's sac fly brought in the second run of the inning and extended the Battling Bishop's leads to 4-0. Ohio Welseyan tacked on an unearned run in the fifth to close the scoring.

“Splitting today's games is acceptable to me,” said Bison head coach Kristan Mallet, whose squad rallied for four runs in the seventh to down Nazareth 9-6 earlier in the day. “We came out flat and didn't make the routine plays. Our bats never came alive, but everyone got to play today and we received some surprises from people I didn't expect. We continue to grow every day.”

Senior Amanda Barker (Granville, Ohio) held the Bison hitless through six and struck out 12 to move to 4-1 on the season.

The Bison return to action on Saturday with games against Wisconsin-Lutheran at 9 a.m. and Polytechnic (NY) at 1 p.m. The Battling Bishops wrap up play in Florida with games against North Central (Ill.) at 9 a.m. and Wisconsin-Superior at 11 a.m.