CLEARWATER, Fla. – Mississippi State’s final game of the TaxAct Clearwater Invitational ended with a tight, 6-5 loss to No. 20/20 UCF on Sunday night.
State (6-4) scored once in each of the first two innings, but UCF (5-5) answered. The Knights scored once in the first and four in the second to take a 5-2 lead with the hold of two errors. MSU would finish with four errors on the night.
“I thought it was a hard-fought game. I liked our response and how we continued to fight,” head coach Samantha Ricketts said. “That’s another quality opponent that’s a Super Regional team [last year]. That’s exactly where we want to be, and we’ve got to figure out a way to clean things up, finish the play, execute a little better, both offensively and defensively going into SEC play. It’s early. We take these as lessons moving forward and with a renewed focus getting back after it next week.”
State’s response began with a two-run homer from Nadia Barbary, the first of her career. It came on the heels of Aquana Brownlee’s first hit of the night. Brownlee would be joined by Jackie McKenna, who drove in two runs, in posting multi-hit games. Those three went a combined 5-for-8 with four RBIs out of the 7-9 slots in the order.
Brownlee would double in the sixth before being bunted over by Barbary. McKenna would drive her in to tie the game at five, but UCF led off the bottom half of the inning with a pinch-hit triple. The Knights scored the game-winning run with two outs in the sixth.
Samantha Ricketts on the bottom three…
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