The Alabama softball team that showed up to play UAB was a different team than the one that lost to McNeese State on Sunday.
No. 10/11 Alabama beat the Blazers 5-0 in Birmingham Tuesday to advance to 13-3 on the season. With the win, the Crimson Tide is now 15-0 against UAB all-time.
Junior pitcher Leslie Jury improved to 6-1 with a 1.32 ERA on the season, throwing her seventh complete game and her fifth shutout.
“I thought Leslie did a great job,” coach Patrick Murphy said. “Haylie [McCleney] just crushed that first ball in the first inning, and then I think that really set the tone. We had a couple of really good defensive plays. We lucked out on the ball that hit the top of the fence and came back in. But other than that, I thought it was a good win.”
(See also “McNeese State ends softball’s winning streak“)
Jury said she appreciated the vote of confidence.
“It feels really good to know that Murph has that confidence in me,” Jury said. “But more importantly I have that confidence in my team because I know that I can throw a drop ball and they can field the ground ball or a rise ball and they’ll catch the pop fly so he has confidence in me, but I have confidence in all the other eight people around me.”
Sophomore centerfielder Haylie McCleney hit her fifth home run in the year. She connected with a ball in the first inning that hit the scoreboard in right field to give Alabama a 1-0 lead.
“I wanted to start the game with a bang, and I guess that was a good way to do it,” McCleney said. “[UAB pitcher Leigh Streetman] had stayed out the majority of that at bat, and then she threw me that in pitch and she kind of hung it over the plate. I tried to put as good a swing on it I could, and luckily it went out, and I think that was a good way to start the game, especially after what happened on Sunday. I just think we needed a little power boost, and that [was] much needed and very timely.”
McCleney went 3-for-4 on the night and her season average is up to .609.
“She’s a true triple threat in softball,” Murphy. “She can lay down a drag, she can slap a base hit, and then you saw tonight, she can hit one out. It doesn’t happen very often, but she is a true triple threat.”
(See also “UA softball to play first ranked team“)
Senior catcher Molly Fichtner added onto Alabama’s lead with a two-out, two-run double in the third inning. Alabama added its final two runs in the seventh inning off an RBI single by senior second baseman Kaila Hunt and an RBI double by freshman pinch-hitter Peyton Grantham.
Jury’s shutout was in jeopardy when Megan McGrath hit a ball to deep centerfield. It bounced off the top of the wall, but Andrea Hawkins was able to relay the ball in to keep McGrath to a single.
“That’s our job in the outfield, to hold runners,” McCleney said. “When it gets to us, they get one base and that’s it.”
Alabama will host Purdue on Friday at 4 p.m. in the Easton Crimson Classic.
(See also “Softball team welcomes new, talented members“)
