No. 8 Virginia Tech ended this weekend’s Easton Bama Bash with a 3-2 record – not only a solid performance, but one that showed the potential of this year’s team.
The Hokies recorded a pair of wins against Evansville (5-1, 5-0), a walk-off win versus Middle Tennessee State (3-2), and lost two close games to No. 2 Alabama (1-0, 2-0).
The story of the weekend was the Hokies’ pitching staff, which gave up a total of six runs in five games, struck out 52 batters in 33 innings, and limited the three opponents to a combined batting average of .142.
The marquee matchup was the Hokies’ showdown with No. 2 Alabama, and the two teams didn’t disappoint.
Although the Crimson Tide won the two games 1-0 and 2-0, Keely Rochard and Emma Lemley were both outstanding for the Hokies. Alabama came into the weekend hitting .366 as a team and averaging almost nine runs per game. Against the Rochard-Lemley combination, the Crimson Tide scored a total of three runs, batted .163 as a team, and struck out 18 times.
For their efforts, both Rochard and Lemley were named to the Bama Bash All-Tournament Team.
“Keely proved why she’s an All American in the first game,” Virginia Tech head coach Pete D’Amour said. “Looking back, If we could have made the play on the cue shot at first, it’s a different game. No blame… It was just the luck of the draw. We had aggressive at bats, but they were almost too aggressive.
“Emma was equally as impressive in game 2 against Alabama. I was extremely proud of how she competed as a freshman. The jitters, if she ever had any to begin with, should be completely gone now with her. We were a couple of key hits away from us winning that game. We just couldn’t get one when it mattered.”
At this point, it appears that Lemley can be that strong No. 2 starter to take some of the load off of Rochard. After 5 games, Lemley is 4-1 with 44 Ks in 22.1 innings. She never flinched against Alabama, and although she lost, she certainly showed she could compete at the highest level.
Lemley (4 IP) and Rochard (3 IP) combined for a shutout on Sunday against Evansville. The two limited the Aces to two hits and struck out 14. That was Rochard’s second save of the year.
Although the Hokies scored 13 runs against Evansville and Middle Tennessee, they were held scoreless against Alabama. The Saturday game was especially frustrating, as they had nine hits against the Tide but couldn’t score.
Typical of their frustration: They loaded the bases with no outs in the first inning but a blistering line drive by Meredith Slaw was grabbed by the Bama third baseman, who then doubled off Kelsey Brown.
“We outhit Alabama both games, but we couldn’t get any extra base hits,” D’Amour said. “That’s the next step for our offense. Can we take three swings at strikes each at bat against an All-American pitcher and try to get one in the gap or over the fence? 12 hits are great, but 12 singles won’t score many runs.”
Hitting was a bit of a concern this weekend as Tech only hit .223 as a team. If not for freshman Bre Peck’s two-out, two-strike walk off home run against Middle Tennessee, it would’ve been a losing weekend.
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D’Amour experimented with numerous lineup combinations in Alabama with 15 different players starting during the five games. Only Cameron Fagan (.412 season average), Emma Ritter (.381), and Kelsey Bennett (.321) started every contest.
“The concerning thing for me is there is a discrepancy between our intersquad swings and our game swings,” D’Amour said. “Mechanically, we’re fine. I need to find the disconnect. We’re late on average velocity and swinging at too many balls. We had four home runs and six doubles against our pitchers outside last week before we left Blacksburg. I’m on a quest to find the nine hitters that can replicate what they do in practice in games.”
Nevertheless, the Hokies find themselves at 8-2 after playing a schedule that Ken Massey ranks as the second-hardest in the country. D’Amour wanted to test his team early to prepare them for postseason play, and these games in Alabama were part of his plan.
“We achieved what we needed to this weekend,” D’Amour said. “My goal was to put our ladies in as challenging of an environment as we could on weekend two. Alabama is always a handful, but having played them a multitude of times in my career, they have a different gear when they’re playing at home in front of 4,000 fans. I think we proved we belong.”
Next up for the Hokies is a Wednesday game at Radford followed by a trip to South Carolina. That four-game tournament consists of three more teams ‒ Miami (OH), South Carolina and Troy ‒ that received NCAA bids last season, in addition to Ohio State.