| SCOREBOARD |
| FINAL | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | R | H | E |
| UP (1-1) | 0 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 9 | 2 |
| DLSU (1-1) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 3 |
The UP Lady Maroons, after losing a crushing 10-4 8th inning loss to the UE Lady Warriors, grinded out a 5-2 win over the De La Salle University Lady Batters last Wednesday at the Rizal Memorial Baseball Stadium.
Prior to the game, UP Lady Maroon head coach Francis Diaz told his team to toughen up their defense and toughen up they did.
In their first game of the season against the UST Softbelles, the DLSU Lady Batters started prized recruit Jamica Arribas as the team’s pitcher. In this game it was another rookie, Bernadette Benson, designated as the team’s starting pitcher.
Benson had a good first inning that only allowed one hit, a single by Louise Bongat, and a strikeout. However, in the 2nd inning, the lady batters from Diliman had adjusted to her pitching. The Lady Maroons managed two hits in the inning and 4 players going to base. As the inning ended, Isabelle Mendoza and Lily Gonzales scored runs for the Lady Maroons to give UP the lead 2-0.
By the 3rd inning, with Gabriella Paz at 2nd base and Bongat at 1st, DLSU head coach Alex Estipular replaced Benson with Arribas to closeout the game. Next at-bat Cochise Diolata secured an RBI that gave Paz a run to give extended UP’s lead. A double play ousted Diolata and Penales and a Mendoza putout ended the inning.
The UP lead ballooned to 5-0 in the 4th inning with runs by Lily Gonzales, her 2nd of the day, and Danielle Cruz.
The batting of the DLSU Lady Batters was stymied by the pitching prowess of UP ironwoman Cochise Diolata. Diolata pitched all the innings for the Lady Maroons and gave up just 2 runs and 4 hits. The 2 runs she allowed came from Arribas in the 4th and Vanessa Borbon in the 6th that cut the UP lead to just three going into the final inning. She then shut out the Lady Batters from Taft in the last inning to secure their first win of the young season.
Coachise Diolata tallied a total of seven strikeouts in the game. On offense she is credited for an RBI coming from a single. 4 batters scored for the Lady Maroons with Lily Gonzales leading the way with 2 runs.
Coach Francis Diaz told us that he was looking forward to their match-up against the Adamson Lady Falcons on Saturday. “We need to toughen up our fielding and make constant contact with the ball. If we do that, we can beat Adamson.” “Everyone is beatable”, the coach concluded.
The Lady Maroons next face the defending champions, the Adamson Lady Falcons, on Saturday, January 31 at 10am while the De La Salle University Lady Batters will go against the Ateneo Lady Batters at 12nn at the Rizal Memorial Baseball Stadium.
