A week after a successful trip to Texas, where Colorado State softball won four out of five games, the Rams suffered a tough weekend against their competition at the Puerto Vallarta College Challenge in Mexico.
The Rams ended the weekend with a five-game losing streak in Puerto Vallarta, and this tournament record drops the Rams to No. 8 in the Mountain West Conference, topping only the University of Nevada.
The Rams faced a tough schedule against the University of Tennessee (No. 12 ranked), the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss), California Baptist University, the University of Utah and Team Mexico. Offense proved to be a weak link in their playing, and despite an unsuccessful weekend only tallying eight runs, the Rams totaled up 22 hits this weekend, eight of which were doubles.
For their first game on Thursday against Tennessee, the Rams kept the game close, only allowing the Lady Volunteers to pull away with a 6-4 victory. CSU fought hard with eight hits, including four doubles, and Danielle Serna got her first home run of the season. Unfortunately, this was not enough to top the Lady Vols, and the Rams earned their first loss of the tournament.
IT'S GONE! Danielle Serna blasts her first homer of her career to left!
Lady Vols 2 // Rams 1
BOT 5— Colorado State Softball (@CSUSoftball) February 13, 2020
Colorado State came back later that night to face Ole Miss, and the Rams kept the game tied for seven innings. Jessica Jarecki battled Ole Miss pitcher Molly Jacobsen for the entire eight-inning contest. Jarecki allowed five hits and walked only one batter, but Jacobsen allowed only two hits and four walks.
The Rams came up short again by a two-run margin accomplished by Ole Miss in the eighth inning, and they fell 2-0. The Rams again fought hard until the last moment, going into an extra inning, but they still fell short of a victory.
On Friday, the Rams faced the California Baptist Lancers in their only game that day. CSU held onto a 2-1 lead for the first three innings, but the Lancers scored three runs in the bottom of the fourth inning to pull ahead of the Rams. Despite scoring one more run in the top of the sixth inning, the Rams couldn’t recover and dropped the game by a score of 4-3.
They later suffered their fourth loss of the tournament in a 3-0 defeat from Utah the following day.
For their final game of the Puerto Vallarta College Challenge, the Rams faced Team Mexico Sunday morning. Colorado State scored a run in the first inning but struggled to bring in additional runs for the rest of the game.
Team Mexico started the game hot, scoring two runs in the first inning and steadily accumulating five more runs throughout the remaining innings to top CSU 7-1. Team Mexico accumulated 10 hits throughout the game, overpowering the three hits by the Rams.
The Rams are on the road again on Feb. 21 for another five-game tournament at the Silicon Valley Classic in San Jose, California. Colorado State is scheduled to play California Baptist again, followed by California Polytechnic State (Cal Poly), Yale, the University of North Dakota and Canisius College.
Savvy Rafkin can be reached at sports@collegian.com or on Twitter @SavvyCollegian.
