PHILADELPHIA – Playing an intercollegiate game for the first time in 385 days, the University of Pennsylvania softball team met a strong Delaware squad on Tuesday afternoon in Penn Park and dropped a pair of games to the Blue Hens, 5-2 in extra innings and 11-0.
 
Delaware came to Penn Park with a 9-2 record and left 11-2 with the sweep.
 
Game 1 – Delaware 5, Penn 2 (8 innings)
Delaware drew first blood in the second inning, as Penn pitcher Julia Longo got into immediately trouble by giving up a walk and a single. With runners on second and third and one out, Emily Blum hit a sharp ball to Penn second baseman Ashley Waco. The junior came home with the throw but couldn't beat Delaware's Brooke Glanden who slid under the tag for the first run. After a strikeout a UD single scored another run, but the Quakers avoided further damage when Brianna Brown's throw from left field beat Blum to the plate and Sarah Schneider tagged her out to end the inning.
 
Penn got one of the runs back in the bottom of the third. Waco opened the frame reaching on an error, and then Alyssa Pope singled. With one out, Brown singled to center but Waco was thrown out trying to get back to third base. That mistake was magnified when Julia Schneider hit a ball up the middle that was just out of reach of the UD shortstop. Pope hustled home on the play from second while Brown advanced from first to third. However, Sarah Schneider flied out and it was 2-1.
 
Penn manufactured the tying run in the fifth, all of the damage being done with two outs. Brown started the rally with a single and stolen base, then came home when Julia Schneider roped a single over the second baseman and into right center.
 
Neither team could break the deadlock through the next two innings, sending the game into extra innings. In the top of the eighth, Chayanna Gallardo smoked a home run over the center-field wall to put Delaware up 3-2, and then the Hens added two more base runners with a pair of singles. Both runners advanced on a double steal, and that paid off when a bad-hop grounder to second allowed both players to score. Penn got back-to-back singles from Sarah Schneider and Laurel McKelvey with one out in the bottom of the frame, but that was all the Quakers could muster as Delaware hurler Emily Winburn shut the door.
 
Longo went the distance in the circle for Penn, allowing eight hits and striking out six. Julia Schneider had two hits and both RBI, while Brown and McKelvey also had two hits. Overall, the Quakers had nine hits but left eight on base in the hard-luck loss.
 
Game 2 – Delaware 11, Penn 0 (5 innings)
The nightcap was a far different story.
 
After a scoreless first inning, Delaware got on the board in the second when Grace Hrustich's single scored Glanden. One inning later, Glanden hit a two-run homer that made the score 3-0.
 
The game got away from Penn in the fourth, as Delaware scored six runs and did all its damage with two outs. A pair of walks and a single loaded the bases, and then Brittney Mendoza roped a ground-rule double to right-center that scored two. A Karoline Flores single scored another run, and then Glanden deposited her second home run of the game, a three-run shot that pushed the Blue Hens in front by 9-0.
 
Penn loaded the bases in the bottom of the fourth but couldn't take advantage, and then Delaware scored two more times in the top of the fifth which closed out the scoring in the game.
 
Bella Fiorentino and Olivia Szewczyk shared pitching duties in the second game. Offensively, the Quakers got hits from Emma Nedley, Sammy Fenton, Abby Manion and McKelvey.
 
Penn is back in action on Saturday, hosting Saint Joseph's for a doubleheader that starts at 12:30 p.m. The Quakers will hold Senior Day festivities prior to first pitch on Saturday.