The game time temperature was 40 degrees with a wind chill of 31 when the No. 25 Northwestern softball team took the field against Illinois-Chicago Tuesday. It was 62 degrees in NU starting pitcher Eileen Canney’s hometown of Paradise, Calif., when the freshman released her first pitch.
Even though players said some Californians would cringe at the thought of playing a softball game outside in this cold, Canney managed to battle the elements and come away with her first win at the Wildcats’ Drysdale Field. NU beat the Flames 8-3 in front of 26 freezing fans in attendance.
“Eileen came out really strong,” sophomore pitcher Courtnay Foster said. “Being from California, she’s never pitched in this kind of weather before. On the West Coast if it was this cold, the game probably would have been canceled.”
The Cats (15-8) started slow, but Canney’s pitching kept the game scoreless for the first two and a half innings. The freshman fanned five batters in her first three innings of work before NU got its sticks going. She finished with five strikeouts and no earned runs in four innings.
“It was pretty exciting,” Canney said. “Overall I think we did pretty well and pulled through this cold day.”
After sophomore center fielder Sheila McCorkle scored from third on a wild pitch, freshman Garland Cooper hit a bomb off the center field wall with two outs and two runners on base. The hit gave the Cats a 3-0 lead — a lead they would never relinquish.
Cooper finished the day 1 for 3 at the plate with a walk and two RBI.
“My first at bat I hit the ball off the end of the bat, and I was kind of upset with it,” Cooper said. “(On the double) I just hit the ball as hard as I could. I had to score those runs because we were struggling to score.”
The Flames (11-6) answered right back in the top of the fourth, putting two unearned runs on the board after Canney lobbed the ball over the first baseman’s head.
But NU made up for the pitching error in the bottom of the inning and built on its third inning rally. Senior second baseman Carri Leto started the scoring when she pounded a single up the middle with two outs and runners on second and third. Both runners scored on the play, and the Cats took a comfortable 5-2 lead.
Leto and senior Eryn Manahan led NU with two hits a piece in the game.
After senior J.C. Kira’s two-run single in the fifth inning, the Cats coasted to the win.
Foster, who relieved Canney in the fifth inning, finished the game with four strikeouts and one earned run in a three-inning save.
“It was great to have our first home game before we started conference play,” Foster said. “We are gathering some momentum coming into conference play, and we are really excited about it.”
