Opening up at Dona Larsen Park, Boise State softball competed in the Springhill Suites Invitational, their first home tournament.
On Friday the Broncos dropped one game against Utah State 5-3, but came back and demolished Idaho State 8-0 later that day.
Coming into the second day of the tournament on Saturday, Boise State split two games, losing against Idaho State 6-4 and beating Portland State 2-1.
In the first game, the Broncos went bat to bat with the Aggies. The Broncos started out strong with Tara Glover scoring off a wild pitch to put the Broncos on the board at 1-0 in the bottom of the first inning.
Pitcher Rebecca Patton kept Utah State scoreless until the top of the sixth where Utah State scored three runs off three hits.
Devon Bridges connected well for Boise State and hit a line drive down the left foul line bringing Makenna Weir to home plate to make the score 3-2.
At the bottom of the seventh, Palmer stepped up and hit an important home run for the Broncos to left
center field.
This tied up the game at 3-3 keeping it alive and sending the game into
extra innings.
“Palmer’s hit was amazing. I mean, it pumped us all up,” Glover said.
However, Boise State couldn’t hold on in the end when Utah State batted in two runs for two hits in the eighth inning. Boise State lost to Utah State 5-3.
“I think that they (Boise State) just figured out that they can’t roll out of bed and come out to win and decided to come out and compete in game two., Head Coach Erin Thorpe said.
Playing back to back games, the women then faced off against Idaho State in the next game.
Connecting well and having aggressive base running, the Broncos trounced the Bengals batting in eight runs for eight hits.
The Broncos ended the game early at the top of the fifth inning with the eight run lead.
Pitcher Lela Work threw a great game allowing only three hits and no runs from the Bengals. Boise State seized victory 8-0 over
Idaho State.
“It’s nice to come back the second game and take charge,” Glover said.
Donning fresh uniforms, the Broncos went up against Idaho State for the second time in the Invitational on Saturday.
Pitcher Kenzie Cole later replaced by Lela Work struggled against the powerful batting from Idaho State’s Amanda Fitzsimmons who batted 2-3 hitting two massive home runs.
“I don’t pay that much attention to who’s up to bat. I just kind of throw what I’m told to throw,” Work said.
The Broncos fielded well with an important double play at the top of the sixth inning to keep the lead at three runs.
Hitting well later in the game, Boise State just couldn’t make it to home plate and only ran in four out of 11 hits overall. The final score ended with a Boise State loss 6-4.
Again playing back to back, Boise State competed against Portland State later in the day.
Both teams remained scoreless until the bottom of the third inning.
With bases loaded and two outs, Bridges hits a line drive up center field to get two runs in for the Broncos to lead 2-0.
Patton coming back to pitch, she and excellent field play kept Portland State scoreless until the top of the sixth when the Vikings scored one run in.
Boise State held off the Vikings in the remainder seventh inning gaining the
win at 2-1.
The Broncos evened their weekend play, with a Sunday finale to wrap up the
tournament.
Prior to this weekend, the women were in a bit of a slump after a weekend sweep at Arizona and only had won three out of their last eight games.
Boise State will continue season play with their next game against Texas Tech at Las Vegas on Saturday, March 23 at 10 a.m.
