Veteran right-handed hurler Ashley Martin tossed a complete-game masterpiece to lead the Lady Marines of Long Beach (3-3 league, 3-4 overall) to a 4-2 victory over MacArthur (3-2 league, 4-2 overall) in a non-conference showdown on April 4 in Levittown.
The Lady Generals countered with their ace-junior Briana Lombardo. The fire-balling righty held up her end of the bargain to keep her team in the game, scattering just four runs on six hits over seven innings of work.
Lombardo worked her way out of several tough jams, but Long Beach broke through with a four-run fourth inning that included an Annie Winerip RBI double and a single from Brianna Rivera that drove home two more runs.
“We had an error, a walk and a collision in the outfield,” said MacArthur head coach Bobby Fehrenbach. “That was the four runs right there. There were some plays that should have been made by us that we didn’t make, but they were also hitting the ball hard.”
Trailing 4-2 in the bottom of the seventh inning, the Lady Generals were down to their last out when sophomore second baseman Kristen Gayy hit a clutch single up the middle to bring the top of the lineup back to the plate.
Sophomore shortstop Jena Cozza came up to bat next and slugged a line-drive single that moved Gayy to third.
MacArthur had the winning run standing at the plate, but Martin closed the door with a strikeout against junior infielder Kristen Brown on a nasty sinking curveball.
“I was a little bit overanxious in my last at-bat,” said Brown. “All I can do is keep working and I’ll get the job done next time. She beat me on a tough pitch.”
The Lady Generals’ offense was provided by a Jena Cozza inside-the-park solo home run in the bottom of the third inning and a RBI double from Brown in the fifth inning.
MacArthur will host Kennedy Bellmore on Saturday, April 16 at 10 a.m. and then take on the Syosset Lady Braves in a tough league contest on Wednesday, April 27 at 4:30 p.m.
