The softball team traveled to Lehigh on Wednesday afternoon to play its last series before the Ivy League season kicks off this weekend.
The Tigers (6-17) competed in two hard-fought battles against the Mountain Hawks (4-18) but came up short in both, losing the first 4-3 and the second 8-5. With the wins, Lehigh improved its home record to 7-1.
Princeton came out strong in the first game, scoring on a solo leadoff home run by senior outfielder Kelsey Quist. The home run was Quist’s 30th for her career, tying her with former teammate Kathryn Welch ’09 for third most in program history.
Lehigh kept pace with the Tigers, though, as the Mountain Hawks tied the score at 1-1 and then again at 3-3 in the fourth after Princeton had pulled ahead by two on an error and a single by junior third baseman Megan Weidrick.
The squad’s bats stalled after the fourth inning, though, as the Tigers remained hitless for the rest of the game. Lehigh pitcher Tiffany Curtis allowed just three hits in a strong complete-game performance and struck out the Tigers eight times.
Freshman pitcher Liza Kuhn managed to keep the Mountain Hawk offense under wraps until the seventh inning, when Lehigh first baseman Julie Fernandez doubled and later scored the game-winning run on a dropped fly ball to right field. Kuhn gave up just two earned runs on seven hits for the afternoon.
The second game of the twin bill saw the Tigers pounce first once again, as Princeton scored three runs in the first inning on doubles by Quist and senior pitcher Jamie Lettire.
The Mountain Hawks responded with three runs of their own in their half of the inning, then tacked on four more in the third to take a 7-3 lead.
Freshman catcher Sarah Rounsifer hit a two-out, two-run double in the fifth to bring Princeton within two, the closest it would come for the rest of the day.
The Lehigh bats added an insurance run in the fourth inning, and Mountain Hawk pitcher Briana Gaumer held the Princeton bats to just one hit in three innings of relief.
Rounsifer earned a career-high three hits in the game, and Quist’s two RBI added to her team-leading total of 17 for the season.
In her eighth start in the circle for the Tigers, Lettire pitched her seventh complete game, which is tied for first in the Ivy League.
Princeton will begin its Ivy League play with a pair of doubleheaders against Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend at Class of 1895 Field.
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