PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania softball team closed out the home portion of its 2023 schedule with a 4-0 victory over Delaware State on Tuesday afternoon at Penn Park.
Danica Larwill and
Brianna Brown had career days leading the Quakers to their fifth win in seven games.
Larwill recorded her first career three hit game as she was 3-for-4 with two RBI and a double.
Alyssa Pope finished out her Penn Park career with a 2-for-3 day as she had a triple and scored a run.
Brianna Brown tied the program record for stolen bases in a single season as she recorded her 19th and 20th stolen bases in the first and second inning, respectively.
FINAL: Penn 4, Delaware State 0
The Quakers jumped allover the Hornets and did it early.
Brianna Brown got on base to lead off the bottom of the first with an infield hit to short and then proceeded to steal her 19th base of the season and advanced to third on a wild pitch.
Danica Larwill followed with her first of three hits. She sent an RBI base hit to center plating Brown for the 1-0 Penn lead.
Dana Anderson was a hit by a pitch and
Bella Fiorentino walked to load the bases with no outs. After the Hornets got the first out at home on a fielder's choice,
Sammy Fenton put the Quakers up 2-0 with a SAC fly to left that scored Anderson from third.
With two outs in the bottom of the second, Brown walked and then stole her 20th base of the season to tie the program's single season record.
Larwill came to the plate and got the job done as she had her second RBI hit in as many at-bats. This time she hit a double to center that scored Brown, giving the home team a 3-0 lead.
Alyssa Pope opened the bottom of the fourth with a triple to left.
Abbie Stellrecht, who entered the game in the top of the fourth, dropped an RBI base hit to shallow center field and Pope raced home to make it a 4-0 Quakers lead.
All four pitchers got in the game on Tuesday as Fiorentino pitched the first two innings retiring all six batters she faced including two swinging strikeouts.
Payton Bean entered in the top of the third and was touched for a lead off double. After getting the count to two strikes on the third batter, she gave way for
Rachel Riley to come on to complete the at-bat with a strikeout and followed with her first strikeout of the game. She worked around a two-out walk to induce the fly out to center for the third out. Riley allowed two hits in the fourth but stranded both batters to keep the Hornets off the board.
Kelly Zybura pitched the final three innings allowing just one base hit while striking out two as she pitched a perfect sixth and seventh inning to close out the victory.
QUAKER NOTEMEAL
- The pitching staff held the opponent scoreless for the third time this season.
- Danica Larwill recorded her first three-hit game with an RBI base hit in the first, an RBI double in the second and a base hit to the catcher in the sixth. Tuesday's game marked just the second time she had two RBI in a game. She previously had two RBI in Penn's 7-3 win over Princeton earlier this season.
- Alyssa Pope recorded the second triple of the season for the Quakers.
- Brown had two more stolen bases to give her 29 in her career. She is now tied with Brooke Coloma (2010-13) with sixth most in program history. With 20 stolen bases in 2023, Brown tied Leah Allen's 2017 record for the most in a single season in program history. One more and she will hold the single season record for stolen bases in program history.
UP NEXT
The Red and Blue are set to close out the 2023 season at Cornell on Friday and Saturday. Penn and Cornell will play one game at 4 p.m. on Friday and then finish up with a doubleheader on Saturday with first pitch of game one at 12:30 p.m.
#FightOnPenn
