UNION, N.J. – The Eastern Connecticut State University softball team found its hitting stroke Sunday morning, and because of that, the Warriors' hopes of advancing beyond the regional round of the NCAA Division III tournament for the second time in three years remains alive.
 
Averaging only seven hits in splitting its first two games in the Union, NJ Regional this weekend, top-seeded and No. 3 nationally-ranked Eastern (39-5) regained its batting eye Sunday morning by breaking open a one-run game when the first eight batters of the fifth inning reached safely in a nine-run explosion that gave the Warriors a 10-0, five-inning victory over third-seeded first-time opponent Alfred University (26-16).
 
The mercy-rule decision – the team's ninth of the year and second in post-season play --  keeps the Warriors alive and headed into the championship round of the tournament, needing two wins to claim a 15^th regional title in the program's illustrious history.
 
The uphill battle continues at 1 p.m. Sunday, Eastern needing two wins over unbeaten host Kean University (32-8) to continue its season this coming weekend in the best-of-three Super Regionals. In 2019, the Warriors won the Medford, MA regional and went on to down visiting  Rowan University in two games at Clyde Washburne Field to win their first Super Regional in their first appearance on the way to a national third-place finish at Tyler, TX.
 
In a winners' bracket 3-2 loss to Kean Saturday, Eastern pitchers Morgan Bolduk (Vernon) and Alexis Michon (Montville) stopped the second-seeded Cougars on two hits, but one of them was a two-out, three-run third-inning double by No. 3 hitter Elilza Filus that wiped out Eastern's 2-0 lead that had come on senior All-America first baseman Brooke Matyasovsky's (Orange) 15^th home run of the year. The homer matched her total of a year ago which is one shy of the season record held by first-team All-America Arielle Cooper and equaled Cooper's career record of 40.
 
Against Kean Saturday, Eastern could turn six hits and five walks into only those two runs off Heather  Clevenger (15-1), who pitched a complete game to vault the hosts into the winners' bracket today needing only one win in two tries.
 
Against Clevenger, Eastern left runners on base in every inning except the seventh, when it went 1-2-3 for the first time and had a 22-game winning streak ended after Matyasovsky lined into a game-ending double play.
 
Sunday morning against first-time opponent Alfred, the Warriors scored the only run it would need after there were two out and none on on senior All-America centerfielder Cassie Woods' (Mystic) bouncer up the middle that scored No. 9 hitter Laura Zenk (Hermon, ME). Zenk drew her first of three walks in the game, moved up on a wild pitch and came home easily on Woods' 21^st RBI of the year.
 
Nursing that one-run lead behind  sophomore LEC Pitcher-of-the-Year Michon (20-1) – who tossed  a complete-game one-hitter for her 17^th straight win this year – Eastern loaded the bases with none out in the fourth but came up empty when starter and loser Arden Hatch (9-7) sandwiched two strikeouts around junior second baseman Alyssa Vilchez' (Brampton, ON) opposite-field line drive to left.
 
In the fifth, however, the Warriors would not be denied, raking relievers Megan Bennett and Mikaela Perez for nine runs on six hits, three walks and a hit batter to turn the game into a blowout.
 
Matyasovsky doubled in the first two runs of the fifth after Zenk, Woods and senior rightfielder Alexis Tyrrell (Torrington) reached safely on two walks and Woods' bunt, and after senior third baseman Julia SanGiovanni (East Haven) extended her career record for hit-by-pitch to 52 (she holds the top three season marks in that category) with her 20^th of the year that re-loaded the bases, Michon, senior leftfielder Carley Stoker (Sandy Creek, NY) and Vilchez all followed with run-scoring singles that made it 8-0, and a bases-loaded walk to Zenk and Woods' bunt single accounted for the final two runs of the inning. Tyrrell lined into a double play that mercifully ended the inning for the Saxons and set up the ensuing mercy rule.
 
Michon set down the first six batters of the game before Alyssa Guitron opened the third by cleanly lining the first pitch of the third into center in a scoreless game.  Guitron was sacrifice to second by Michon got No. 9 hitter Gillian Flint to foul out and struck out leadoff hitter Ashley Lugo to keep the game scoreless.
 
Michon walked two after there was one out in the fourth but Eastern's defense helped protect the 1-0 lead when senior catcher Carolyn Biel (Wallingford) picked off No. 3 hitter Mya Wells for the second out and Michon induced an inning-ending comebacker. With a 10-0 lead, Michon did not allow a ball out of the infield in the fifth.
 
Woods had three of Eastern's eight hits, giving her 64 on the season – the fifth-most in a season in program history behind former all-Americas Cooper (who holds the top two marks), Trish Wodatch and Alyssa Hancock. Zenk came around to score three runs – twice in the fifth -- after walking each time.

The 39 wins equal the second-most in a season in program history. The 2010 team won that many when it won a regional championship and the 2012 team finished with a record 44 wiins (against three losses) in reaching the regional final at Clyde Washburne Field.