What a difference a day can make.
Twenty-four hours after Northwestern’s bats were silenced by Loyola (Chicago), the Wildcats (19-25) came alive with 13 hits in a 12-3 rout over Northern Illinois (18-29) on Wednesday.
The much-needed win came with a milestone for first baseman Adrienne Monka. With two home runs in the game, the senior now has 51 for her career, joining Tammy Williams, Garland Cooper and Nicole Pauly as the only NU players with 50 or more long balls.
“It’s an honor to be in their company,” Monka said. “To be in the same league as them with those home runs is really awesome, and anything I can do to help the team is also really great.”
The three-hit game was a return to form for Monka, who has had a down year by her standards. Prior to the game, she was on pace for 42 RBIs, which would match the lowest total of her career. With her five RBIs Wednesday, however, she is on pace for 48 RBIs, which would be the second-best total of her career.
“Monka got back on track for sure (Wednesday),” coach Kate Drohan said. “I think she’s seeing the ball well and she was confident in the batter’s box and took some good cuts.”
NU started the scoring with two runs in the first inning, courtesy of an error by Northern Illinois shortstop Amanda Sheppard. After a run by the Huskies in the bottom of the first, sophomore Marisa Bast added to her team-leading RBI total with a two-RBI single in the top of the second.
Northern Illinois pushed across two more runs in the third off sophomore Sammy Albanese, but the Huskies would go quietly from there, getting only three more hits and no runs.
Sophomore Jenny Tyler, coming off her first collegiate start Tuesday, pitched three scoreless innings to close out the win.
“I was a lot more comfortable today compared to yesterday, ” Tyler said. “It also helped coming in a little later in the game after we had a pretty good lead. It was very comfortable to just go in and finish the game off for us.”
The Cats put the game out of reach in the fifth with an RBI double by Albanese and a two-run home run by second baseman Anna Edwards, giving NU an 8-3 lead. They added one more in the sixth and three more in the seventh off Monka’s three-run blast over the right field fence.
NU will try to build off this victory as it climbs back into the NCAA Championships race. The Cats sit at No. 48 in the RPI rankings, in the same general area they have been for the last couple of weeks. Only 64 teams make the tournament, including conference winners who may not be in the top 64 in the RPI rankings, so NU will need to build off of Wednesday’s performance.
“It’s about playing the game the way we want to play it,” Drohan said. “Some things we did well today – we stole a lot of bases today, we didn’t give up any walks, our pitchers had command of the game, they were working quickly. That’s how we want to play this weekend, so it’s good to see it happen in the game.”
