LAKE CHARLES — To say the Northwestern State softball team's pair of games at McNeese on Friday night differed from one another would constitute an understatement.
The Lady Demons didn't have much offense to speak of in the opener, but then discovered enough in the nightcap. That resulted in the Cowgirls winning the first game, 3-0, and NSU taking the second, 3-2.
"I thought the biggest (difference) was we didn't swing at the pitches they wanted us to swing at, early," head coach Donald Pickett said. "I thought we made an adjustment at the end of that first game, and we did a lot better job."
The split moves NSU to 20-18 overall and 14-9 in Southland Conference play. McNeese sits at 27-23 overall and 15-8 in league action.
The Lady Demons had eight hits in the victory to where they only had a pair of base knocks in the defeat. And it wasn't just the hits that equated to win No. 20. NSU was squaring more pitches up and playing small ball in certain situations.
"We were able to not only get some hits, but we got some bunts down, moved some runners, and made some things happen to be able to score some runs," Pickett said. "We got some two-out hits, which were big for us — which we hadn't been getting — and we got a good pitching performance."
The series concludes Saturday with a single game at 1 p.m. The Lady Demons will be aiming for their first series win in Lake Charles since 2015.
NSU 3, McNeese 2
The two-out hits Pickett alluded to were both off the bat of senior outfielder Kaitlyn St. Clair. She recorded clutch RBI base hits in the second and fourth innings, respectively.
The good pitching performance was provided by junior E.C. Delafield. She went all seven innings, allowing two earned runs on eight hits with four strikeouts.
"She just kept pitching, and she stayed confident," Pickett said. "She kept making her pitches, putting the ball where it needed to be, and was really confident with her movement. It's hard to square her up, and it's hard to get that big hit on her."
Delafield worked around base runners in every inning but two of them. And those two ended up being the final two frames, which improved her record to 9-3 on the season.
Freshman infielder Keely Dubois laid claim to the first run batted in for NSU. She logged a sacrifice fly with the bases loaded that scored Delafield in a first inning that featured as many hits as the Lady Demons had in all of Game 1.
The Cowgirls scored their runs in the second and fourth innings but never led and never drew even with NSU.
McNeese 3, NSU 0
Junior Jensen Howell received the start and pitched effectively. She went six innings, yielding three earned runs on five hits with four strikeouts, but the loss dropped her to 6-9.
The Cowgirls struck first on a solo home run from Haylee Brinlee in the third. She boasted another RBI in the fourth, and McNeese added one more insurance run in the sixth.
Delafield broke up the perfect game with a single in the top of the seventh. Junior infielder Cayla Jones also had a hit in the inning, as the Lady Demons brought the tying run to plate but couldn't score a run.
