St. Cloud, Minn.- The University of Minnesota Duluth softball team kicked off NSIC competition with a split out in St. Cloud, dropping game one of the doubleheader against the Huskies 3-1 before rebounding with a 4-0 victory. The effort starts the Bulldogs off with a 1-1 record in conference play to tack on to a 15-6 overall mark. 

In an opening game where scoring ended up being hard to come by, it was the Bulldogs that struck first. A single from Nicole Schmitt in the top of the second was enough to drive Sidney Zavoral home and secure a 1-0 lead. UMD was poised to add on to this advantage later in the inning, landing runners on both second and third and only one out. But St. Cloud State did good work to get out of the jam, racking up two-straight strikeouts to leave those potential scorers stranded. 

It's a moment that proved all-the-more important given what would happen in the bottom of the fourth. There, a Josey Marquette double ended up scoring both Jamie Odlum and Jasmin Estrada, which was enough to snag SCSU the lead at 2-1.
 
Then came defining moment number two. In the top of the fifth, the Bulldogs' bats not only returned to that second-inning form but evolved past it. WIth just one out on the scoreboard, UMD found itself with the bases loaded, a massive opportunity to put more numbers on the board. But a tough bounce saw the Bulldogs ground into a double-play ball, thus leaving the score at 2-1 SCSU. 

In the bottom of the fifth came more misfortune. With the Huskies down to their final out of the inning, Estrada was able to connect on a single to center field to drive in Sydney Trees and bring SCSU's lead to two at 3-1. The Huskies would end up juicing the bases shortly afterwards, but a Lauren Dixon strikeout was enough to send the Bulldogs into the sixth within striking distance. 

Close, but just barely out of reach. UMD would push a runner all the way to third in the top of the sixth with one out, but a pair of strikeouts would leave the score unchanged going into the bottom of the frame. Ultimately, it'd stay at 3-1 right until the end. Dixon was able to leave a runner stranded herself to send the Bulldog offense up to bat in the top of the seventh, but UMD couldn't quite generate the needed runs to extend the contest. 

If the score alone isn't enough to show that this game was tightly contested, try this stat on for size: each team had exactly seven hits in this one. The difference maker proved to be a tandem of SCSU pitcher Trinity Junker (who went the full seven innings in this one) and the general Husky defense, these powers combined always finding ways to keep the Bulldogs from truly breaking the seal.

All-the-same, it was UMD that again opened the scoring in the doubleheader's second game. Corrie Weise drilled a double that would bring in Kiana Bender to make it 1-0. But it'd already been seen that this alone wasn't enough- it'd be nice to have a supplemental spark. 

Enter Elle Potts.

It started on defense. Still up one in the bottom of the third, Potts made a strong play to not only catch a hardly hit ball but rifle it over to first just as hard to secure a massive, inning-ending double play. Didn't stop there, though. Up towards the top of the fourth, Potts would make good contact on a ball to send it out into center field. This alone would've been enough to advance the runner already on base in Julia Gronholz, perhaps even send her home. And in a tough contest like this, that would've been great in and of itself. But when the ball snuck under the center fielder's glove and all the way to the fence, Potts saw an opportunity and (literally) ran with it. All the way around the bases the junior infielder went, eventually beating the throw to the plate to secure a monumental inside-the-park homerun. Just like that, it was 3-0 Bulldogs. 

The fifth inning called for a little bit of insurance, and it came by way of the big bat of Bender. The junior rifled a triple out to right center to put herself right in scoring position with only one out on the board. A Weise flyout on the next at-bat was enough to send Bender home and leave the score at 4-0 UMD.

Time to showcase another star from this one: Dixon. The junior had already put up a valiant effort to close game one, allowing just one hit in her 1.1 innings of work. In game two, she proved to be a whole different animal, something that was on full display down the stretch. In the final three innings of her complete game effort, exactly two Huskies made it on base, one by hit, one by walk. Meanwhile, in that same stretch of time, Dixon tallied six strikeouts. That included a masterclass 1-2-3 seventh inning to send the Bulldogs home with a 4-0 victory. All-told, Dixon ended the game with a whopping 13 Ks, not only a new benchmark for her on the season but a tie for the second-most she's ever thrown in a single outing. 

A trio of Bulldogs stood out offensively for UMD by the game's end. Potts and Bender tied for the team-lead in hits, with Potts going 2-3 from the plate and Bender 2-4. Bender had the slight edge in terms of runs, though, crossing the plate twice. Weise had the most RBIs in game two with two. On the other end, Maggie Fitzgerald was the Huskies' leading offensive producer, going 2-3. Justyce Porter was tagged with the loss at the mound, allowing four runs through five innings pitched. 

ANSWERS FROM ANDERSON

Before talking too much more about everything that happened on Tuesday, it's important to take a step back and look at the path that led us here at all. 

It was a bit nontraditional. Remember, an entire month separated UMD's non-conference games from the beginning of its NSIC slate. That's quite a mid-season hiatus. The thing is, though… it's not a complete break. Rest assured that practice is still on. And in a situation like the one the Bulldogs faced where there's that kind of downtime between true games, that time together takes on a new kind of importance.

New importance, New structure. Maybe you can't have live competition, but that doesn't mean that that kind of play can't be emulated. Just ask UMD head coach Lynn Anderson.

"We spent much of our practices this past month adding competitive value to them in order to make each day's practice as game-like as possible," Anderson said. "And I felt our team competed every inning today." 

It's an edge that could be seen even in defeat throughout the day's first game- particularly at the plate.

The goal of every at-bat is to touch a base, but you don't necessarily have to do so to have had a productive outing. That's where the art of the long-haul comes into play, a plate appearance that eats up pitch after pitch, simply refusing to die. That exact brand of at-bat was employed by the Bulldogs on more than one instance in game one, and though it didn't end up leading to victory, it shouldn't go entirely unnoticed. It sure didn't fly by Anderson.

"Any time you can extend an at bat with 6+ pitches thrown allows the batter the ability to see the ball better, create good timing, and thus can more often than not end with a hit or base on balls," Anderson said. "I believe Dea had the longest one today where she gritted out an 11-pitch at bat. That was great. I definitely liked that we made their pitcher work to get us out."

That's the thing about those long stays at the plate- keep generating fresh chances, and your next one might finally be the one where you break through. Or, admittedly, it might not be- and that margin can be razor thin.

It's a phenomenon that extends throughout the entirety of the sport, something Anderson talked about in relation to both of the day's contests.

"Hats off to St Cloud to come back and take game one," Anderson said. "They were able to make one or two plays that they had the ball bounce their way. Our game is a game of inches. (Sidney's) line out to 3rd with bases loaded in the 5th…if that ball was less than a foot any other direction, I believe we'd be in at least a 3-3 tie right there. The Huskies had a couple more timely hits than us when it mattered. But we're a team that can do that too. We've proven it already this season so we know we're capable. And game two we came up with those hits more consistently."

Case-and-point: that Potts homer. Inches under the glove of the outfielder equals a whole new runway all the way to the fence. Same thing with Potts' play in the field to help set up her big scoring drive- that ball's hit inches further in either direction, and it could've been a Husky rallying across all the bases. Instead, somehow, the stars aligned perfectly for Potts twice within the span of, maybe 10 minutes? Call it luck, but here's the thing- you've got to be good to be lucky.

Anderson probably could have stopped here when it came to that Potts sequence:

"Yeah, how about that series."

Instead, though, she was gracious enough to continue. In doing so, we were able to receive further evidence that this wasn't just some kind of cosmic intervention that allowed Potts to pull all this off.

"Here's the thing, Elle makes those plays all the time in the hot corner in practices too," Anderson said. "It goes to show that Elle's someone that practices like she plays, and she's zoned in. She brings a level of leadership to this team and lifts up the play of the people around her. She works tremendously hard and is one of the most coachable players I've ever had. It was so fun to see her get that hit and leg it out around the bases."

A similar conversation can be had with who was at the mound for the Bulldogs in game two.

Dixon put on a true pitching clinic on Tuesday- one so good, Anderson and company adjusted around it. Quite willingly so. 

"It's why Lauren was chosen as NSIC Pre-Season Pitcher of the Year," Anderson said. "She was incredible against a lineup that can hit well and hit for power. Estrada was one of their hottest hitters coming into today and we held her to one hit all day, with Lauren striking her out in all three at-bats. We had a plan for relief pitchers coming in later on in game two, but when a pitcher is cruising like how Lauren was, you keep giving them the ball. Our pitchers know that and they celebrate each other's successes so well together. It's a great chemistry."