Box Score
DUDLEY, Mass. – Sophomore Elizabeth Mitchell (Coventry) homered on the fifth pitch of the game and carried a perfect game into the fifth inning before settling for a one-hit shutout that led the Eastern Connecticut State University softball team to a 13-0, five-inning non-conference win over Nichols College in the first game of a scheduled doubleheader Wednesday afternoon.
 
Behind her team's 13-hit attack, Mitchell (6-2) took a perfect game into the bottom of the fifth inning before cleanup hitter Allie Silliman singled to center on the first pitch to break up a potential third perfect game and 42^nd no-hitter in program history.
 
In posting her third shutout in eight starts this year, Mitchell fanned eight different batters once each without a walk, and hit a batter.
 
After slamming her second leadoff home run of the season in the top of the first, Mitchell struck out the side in the bottom of the inning – all of them on swinging 3-2 counts. Mitchell also struck out one in the second and third innings and got all three outs in the fifth on strikeouts.
 
Following Silliman's single leading off the fifth, Mitchell struck out the next two batters before hitting pinch hitter Peyton Blackinton on a 2-0 pitch. She got Hannah Cozza looking to end the game. Mitchell threw 47 of her 70 pitches for strikes and faced only two batters over the minimum of 15.
 
Leading 6-0, the Warriors tacked on seven runs in the fifth on six hits and two walks, with first-year junior Hadley Marchand (Andover) closing out the scoring by stroking a grand slam – her first HR in an Eastern uniform.
 
At the plate, Mitchell reached three times on two hits and a walk, drove in two runs and scored three, while sophomore third baseman Sam Healy (Cranston, RI) also reached three times with two hits and a walk. She scored two runs and drove in three – one coming on a one-out solo home run (her second of the year) in a three-run second inning in which Mitchell doubled home the second run and junior leftfielder Kaley Laird (Bristol) plated the third with a two-out single.
 
Junior centerfielder Julia Boya (Coventry) scored three runs, reaching twice on walks and stealing her sixth and seventh bases of the year.
 
Last year behind Conference New England Pitcher-of-the-Year Chelsea Indyk, the Bison reached the CNE tournament finals and finished with 32 wins. In the first game of a doubleheader split last year at Eastern, Indyk threw a complete-game three-hitter with eight strikeouts in her team's 4-1 win.