ORMOND BEACH, Fla. (May 10, 2018)-Florida A&M's Hera Varmah hit a solo home run just over the left field wall in the seventh inning, which proved to be the game winner, as the defending Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) champion Rattlers defeated top-seeded Morgan State, 2-1 in a winner's bracket second round contest of the MEAC Softball Championship on Thursday afternoon at the Ormond Beach Sports Complex.
FAMU (22-27), in search of its fifth straight MEAC title, advances to Friday's winner's bracket final at noon, where they will face archrival Bethune-Cookman, who was a 3-2 winner over Savannah State, for a trip to Saturday's championship round.
Morgan State (28-16) will now take on northern division foe Hampton in a win-or-go-home elimination game later Thursday evening.
If there was any indication of how much of a battle today's contest would be, it may have come during the first at-bat of the game, when FAMU's Tyra Bowers and Morgan State starting pitcher Stephanie Rundlett began with a 14-pitch battle, which resulted in a walk. The Rattler would strike first when Taylor Rosier stole second and third, allowing Bowers to steal home for the 1-0 in the top of the first.
The game would stay that way until the third inning when Damali Young got on base after being hit by a pitch and then recorded her 98th career steal when she stole second. Giselle Alvarez singled to left field to score Young and tie the game at 1-1.
Amy Begg would replace Rundlett with one out and two Rattlers on base in the fifth and got out of the inning with back-to-back groundouts.
FAMU would again threaten in the sixth inning when Begg would be faced with bases loaded and just one out. The reigning back-to-back MEAC Pitcher of the Year, got the next two FAMU batters to pop out and fly out to end the Rattlers' sixth.
After Varmah's lead-off homer in the seventh, Morgan State would try to make something happen when Stormy Zyzyk reached base with one out after being hit by a pitch. However, FAMU pitcher Kyaira Brown, who recorded 11 strikeouts in the game, got the next two Lady Bear batters to foul out at third and strikeout, respectively to end the game.
Brown of FAMU pitched a complete game, surrendering two hits and a runs to improve to 15-11 on the season.
Begg (16-7), who was charged with the loss, surrendered one run on one hit in 2.2 innings of work. Rundlett, who started the contest, totaled three strikeouts and allowed a run on one hit in 4.1 innings of work.
Evvie Buehlman and Alvarez each had a hit for the Lady Bears, while FAMU's two hits game from Rosier and Varmah.
