Despite 4-1 weekend showing, softball's Watten not entirely happy

Coach Laura Watten didn't mince words in calling the Terrapin softball team's late-weekend finish "awful" yesterday.

Never mind that the Terps won their final four games to wrap up a 4-1 weekend at the Under Armour Showcase at South Florida.

Instead, the measures it took to get to that point — suffering through three games decided in the team's last at-bat against average competition — had the Terps' sixth-year coach frustrated.

"We don't need to get to those places," Watten said. "As a team, we're better than that. We come alive under the pressure of those extra innings. We've got to take care of ourselves in the front end of a game and not worrying about getting into that place and fighting to win games."

Infielder Lexi Carroll was at the center of two of the game-winning innings, recording a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the seventh against St. John's (11-13) for a 4-3 victory Saturday and hitting a solo home run in the top of the eighth yesterday against Quinnipiac (8-10) as part of a four-run inning that took the Terps to a 4-1 win. The Terps (13-9) also needed a four-run eighth inning Saturday against Saint Joseph's in another 4-1 win.

"If we don't go out there with a good mentality and set a tone early, we struggle throughout the game, and we put ourselves in those situations where we've got to have some clutch performances," Watten said. "I don't like it at all. I want to win in five [innings]."

Watten could point to the team's Friday game as evidence of the dangers of slow starts. Against No. 16 Nebraska (19-2), the Terps fell behind by two runs in the game's first two innings and never fully recovered. Errors — which Watten said were the team's undoing in a 3-2 loss to East Carolina on Wednesday — again plagued the team in an eventual tournament-opening 6-4 loss.

And while Watten isn't fond of waiting until the end for her team to win, she knows it can be an advantage for her squad.

"It says a lot about our fight," she said. "We don't ever give up, and we don't ever let up. We were actually in a position to come back in that Nebraska game. We do have some surges of energy, and some good things happen. It's good to see their confidence level going into those games. To be winning all those extra inning games is a big deal."

Even amid continued team-wide struggles, several individual stars continued to stand out.

In a 6-0 win over Colorado State (5-19) on Friday, pitcher Ashley Czechner recorded a career-high 14 strikeouts while allowing only three hits in the shutout.

With pitcher Kendra Knight absent from action due to a death in her family, Watten called on Kerry Hickey for four starts in the five-game slate. The senior went 2-1, striking out 30 batters and giving up seven runs over 24.1 innings.

"I think our pitching did really well this weekend," Watten said. "Really, our issues were defensively making plays consistently and then also executing in some other areas offensively."

Carroll led the Terps at the plate, going 8-for-15 with two home runs, six RBI, two runs scored and a double.

"She's gotten some more opportunities," Watten said. "She's got a really good strong bat. She's a good hitter, and I think she just got more opportunities and more looks. She's been able to kind of come through and feel pretty confident in the box."

Despite a weekend filled with concerning developments, Watten still saw the end result — four wins — as the positive that it obviously was.

"It was just recognizing the ups and downs that we've been having, and I think it's just learning to steer the course," she said. "We just got focused on going out in the next game and producing."

dgallen@umdbk.com