Perryman's big day carries Elgin to 7th straight
Elgin's explosive offense may have been a little quiet on Monday, but it really didn't matter with the way Jennah Perryman was pitching.
The senior right-hander struck out 12 batters and threw a complete game 2-hitter in the Maroons' 4-1 Upstate Eight Conference crossover victory against visiting Metea Valley. Perryman also helped herself at the plate as she went 3-for-3 with 2 doubles, an RBI, and a run scored.
Elgin (8-5) has now won seven in a row and remains undefeated at 4-0 in the UEC River Division.
Perryman's bid for a second career no-hitter was broken up with two outs in the sixth inning when the Mustang's Alise Perna cracked an opposite field home run over the left-center field fence. Other than that she was nearly untouchable. Perryman (4-1) only walked two batters and just three balls made it out of the infield.
"I could tell early on my changeup wasn't working, so I went more to my hard stuff," Perryman said. "My rise ball was my main pitch. I knew they were having a tough time catching up to it, so I just kept throwing it."
Perryman retired the first 9 batters in order before yielding a walk to lead off the fourth inning. She had 7 strikeouts through the first 3 innings.
"She had dominating stuff today and was in control right from the start," Elgin coach Dr. Nick Bumbales said. "Her and (catcher) Kelly (Bremer) do such a great job of setting things up and making adjustments during the game."
The Maroons offense, which has averaged over eight runs a game and scored 39 runs in a doubleheader over the weekend, had to nickel and dime its way to single runs in the first, second, third, and fifth innings.
"We kind of had the Monday blahs at the plate," Bumbales said. "But we were able scratch across 4 runs and fortunately when you have someone like Jennah pitching that's usually going to be enough."
Perryman got the Maroons on the board with an RBI single in the first inning that scored Anna Eckholm, who had led off with a single. Melanie Berg drove in the Maroons' second run with a single in the second inning.
In the third inning Perryman led off with a double and scored on a single off the bat of Bremer. The Maroons tacked on an unearned run in the fifth inning.
"I had been pulling my head lately, so I just worked on staying back on the ball today," Perryman said. "The focus at the plate for everyone has just been putting the barrel on the ball."
The Mustangs' struggles continued as they dropped their 10th game in a row and fell to 3-10, 2-3.
Elise Titiner threw a complete game and took the loss.
"We knew she was a rise ball pitcher and we played right into her hands," Metea Valley coach Kris Kalivas said. "We swung at pitches we shouldn't be swinging at and didn't swing at ones we should have swinging at. We are a young team and with the schedule the way it has been we are still learning on the fly."