EMCC Lady Lions earn DH softball split at Pearl River with 5-4 nightcap win

POPLARVILLE — For the second time in a week's span, East Mississippi Community College's softball team earned a doubleheader split with a nightcap victory on the road.  The Lady Lions bounced back from a 15-1 run-rule setback to Pearl River to claim a 5-4 win over the Lady Wildcats in the second game of Saturday's MACCC softball twin bill played at Wildcat Stadium.

Following the opening-game loss, EMCC fell behind early in the nightcap after PRCC plated a pair of runs in the second inning on a groundout and a sacrifice fly.

The Lady Lions responded by tying the game in the fourth inning on a double steal that scored Hope Thames following her RBI double that brought home Allison Brown.  The visitors then manufactured two more runs an inning later by taking advantage of a couple of PRCC fielding miscues to move ahead, 4-2.

Pearl River promptly knotted the score again by adding another two-run tally in the home half of the fifth on back-to-back groundouts that came on the heels of Emily Rigney's leadoff triple and a bunt single by Taelor York.

EMCC starting pitcher Rylee Bourland then helped herself by breaking the 4-4 tie with her third home run of the year – all coming in the last six games – in the top of the sixth inning.  The Hatley High School product then returned to the circle to preserve her second win of the season by keeping the Lady Wildcats off the board in the sixth and seventh innings.   

For the game, Bourland scattered six hits, without issuing a walk and striking out a pair, to notch her second straight complete-game victory in as many starts.  A week ago during EMCC's 8-2 nightcap win at Southwest Mississippi, Bourland went the distance in allowing just five hits to notch her first collegiate victory.  The Amory native also previously belted her first two collegiate home runs – one in each game - during last week's road doubleheader split with Southwest. 

In Saturday's nightcap at Pearl River, freshman third baseman Kaitlynn Stroud accounted for half of EMCC's six hits with three singles.

During the opening contest against PRCC, the Lady Lions could only manage a solo run in the second inning on Jenna Coker's RBI single.

In contrast, the Lady Wildcats scored runs during all four of their at-bats, including five runs in the second inning and seven more the following frame.  Aunie Rethmeyer smacked a pair of home runs in the opener and Abigail Thexton added a two-run shot for Pearl River.

Coach Austin McNair's EMCC Lady Lions (2-18, 2-12 MACCC) are scheduled to play host to the Coahoma Lady Tigers in a 1 p.m. Wednesday afternoon doubleheader at the EMCC Softball Field.