April 12, 2002

Box Score

Urbana, Ill. - In the crazy world that is the Big Ten softball race, the goal is to win any way you can. At the start of the evening it was questionable whether or not the skies would clear to allow Illinois to meet Indiana in softball. After an hour delay, the skies cleared, and Illinois manufactured a 2-1 win over the visiting Hoosiers.

The win combined with the rest of the day's action puts Illinois in a four-way tie for sixth in the conference, just a game behind fifth-place Wisconsin.

Illinois played textbook softball, winning without that many hard hit balls. In the first inning, the Illini's Lindsey Hamma led off with a walk followed by an infield single by Erin Jones. Janna Sartini, second on the team in RBI despite missing 17 games to injury, bunted both runners over, allowing Hamma to score on an Erin Montgomery ground out.

The second inning saw much of the same. Sarah Baumgartner led off with a double to the right-center field gap. LeAnn Butcher bunted her to third, where she scored on a Katie O'Connell ground out.

Sherri Taylor, meanwhile made the runs stand up. Taylor retired the first eight batters she faced, then seven more in a row at one point, until Indiana finally got on the board with a run in the sixth. A single by ninth-place batter Monique Bullock, who had two of four Hoosier hits on the night, and a double from Abby Stark, put runners at second and third with just one out.

Taylor worked the count then struck out Indiana's top hitter, Stormy Hanson, swinging. The next batter, Heather Stillians sent a chopper to the normally slick fielding Erin Jones. The ball took a bad hop to allow Bullock to score, but a heads up Lindsey Hamma recovered the ball in time to throw out Stark, who tried to score from second. Taylor then retired the Hoosiers in order in the seventh.

"A lot of shortstops wouldn't have made that play," said Sullivan of Hamma. "After a tough play, you have to know where the next throw goes, and Lindsey was heads up in throwing out the runner trying to score."

Taylor did a great job of mixing up the pitches and struck out four, including twice against Hanson. "That shows a lot maturity at the pitcher and catcher spots. Janna (Sartini) called a good game behind the plate and Sherri executed well," said Sullivan.

Lauren Gronski was 2-for-3 with a double. Alicia Hammel entered the game as a pinch-runner, stayed in the game and went 2-for-2.

Illinois hosts Indiana in the second game of the series at noon on Saturday. Those fans that bring their dog to the game get in for $1.