Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 | Box Score 3
CLERMONT, Fla. – After completing a suspended game with a victory over Macalester College Tuesday night, the Eastern Connecticut State University softball team completed a rare trifecta, winning three games in a span of seven hours at The Spring Games.
 
On the third day of the spring trip, Eastern (4-0) rode two complete-game pitching efforts by sophomore righty Elizabeth Mitchell (Coventry) and the first career CG by first-year righty Leah Chatfield (Naugatuck) to victories over Franklin & Marshall College (13-5 in six innings) and Concordia University (TX) (3-2) at the Bartow Sports Complex during the afternoon, then followed up the sweep two hours and 50 miles later by wrapping up a 5-1 victory over Macalester at the Legends Way Ballfields.
 
Eastern 13, Franklin & Marshall 5 (6 inn.)
 
Chatfield (2-0) pitched a nine-hitter with five strikeouts and the Warriors collected 15 hits and recorded at least two runs in five of their six at-bats against the Diplomats (1-2). Leading 8-5, Eastern ended the game by pushing across five runs on five hits in the top of the sixth inning.
 
Batting leadoff, Mitchell reached in all four of her plate appearance with three singles and a walk, driving in two runs and scoring three, with No. 2 hitter, junior Kaley Laird (Bristol) reaching three times with singles, scoring three runs and driving in a run. Sophomore cleanup hitter Sam Healy (Cranston, RI) doubled twice, scoring both times.
 
Eastern 3, Concordia (TX) 2
 
In its most impressive win of the early season, Eastern handed the Tornadoes (16-4) only their second loss in their last ten games with the walkoff win. Concordia reached Mitchell for ten hits but last year's Little East Conference Pitcher-of-the-Year stranded 12 runners, including five in the first two innings when Concordia took a 1-0 lead in the first. Mitchell fanned four, hit a batter and walked only two.
 
The Warriors recorded the walkoff win in the bottom of the seventh behind the baserunning of Laird, who opened the inning with a walk off new pitcher Mayson Post, hustled to third with a head-first slide on No. 3 hitter Maddy Bowen's (Hudson, NH) opposite-field single to right, and beat the throw home from first baseman Karlee Mathis on Healy's ground ball to third.s
 
Eastern tied the game, 1-1 with an unearned run in the fourth on singles by first-year junior transfer Hadley Marchand (Andover) and junior Reagan Lalor (Danbury), two walks and costly infield error that allowed pinch runner Ashlyn Kenefick (Southington) to score the tying run. The Warriors took their first lead with a run in the bottom of the sixth on hits by Marchand and senior Abby Thompson (Westborough, MA) and a wild pitch before the Tornadoes tied in the top of the seventh on Mathis' RBI single, but Mitchell stranded two.
 
Eastern 5, Macalester 1
 
Just over two hours after retiring the final out against Concordia, Mitchell was back on the mound to complete an eight-hit win over Macalester (4-7). The game resumed after it had been suspended Sunday with Eastern leading 1-0 and Macalester batting with one out and the bases empty in the fourth.
 
 When play resumed Tuesday, the Warriors broke a 1-1 tie with what proved to be the (unearned) winning run in the bottom of the fifth. With two out and No. 9 hitter Julia Boya (Coventry) on first via an infield single, Bowen drove a hard single to right that got by rightfielder Ainsley Sullivan and allowed Boya to circle the bases.
 
Eastern padded the lead with three insurance runs in the sixth, highlighted by junior transfer shortstop Grace Jenkins' (Groton) two-out RBI triple to center that sent in Thompson, which had singled with one out. A wild pitch and double steal accounted for the final two runs of the inning.
 
The only run surrendered by Mitchell came on her first pitch after play resumed when Tess Bojorquez unloaded a solo home run to center that tied the game at 1-all. Mitchell struck out five and walked only one to record her 21^st complete game in 25 career starts.
 
On Thursday at Hancock Park in Clermont, Eastern faces No. 14 nationally-ranked UW-Whitewater at 9 a.m. and the University of Chicago at 11:15 a.m.