Box Score 1 | Box Score 2 Millersville, Pa. – In the team's final tune up before its home stretch of its schedule, the Marauders couldn't come away with a win in a pair of games against Georgian Court Tuesday, dropping the opener by a slim 1-0 margin, then falling in game two, 6-4.
 
After playing the Lions, Millersville embarks on the final four games of its schedule hoping to make the PSAC Tournament for the first time in team history, but needs to win out and get help from other teams to get there. The team will play Friday at Shippensburg and Saturday at home in the final doubleheader of the regular season against West Chester to determine its playoff fate.
 
Game one of the day's action saw Sarah Bertoni take the hard luck loss, dropping her record on the season to 15-8. In her 20^th complete game of the year, the sophomore spun seven full innings of one-run ball, yielding just four hits and a walk while striking out five. Bertoni's spectacular effort was not enough to lift an offense that couldn't put a run on the board. The one earned run she allowed was the first in her last three starts.
 
Against Lion starter Kristina Morgan, the Marauder bats managed just four hits, one each from Danielle DiFilippo, Jamie Motsko, Cara Nance and Stephanie Kulp. After Georgian Court took the lead in the top of the fourth inning on an RBI single by Taylor McDonough, the only threat Millersville mustered were two base runners in the bottom of the fifth. Nance and Kulp strung together back-to-back two-out base knocks, but the threat was ended when Morgan got a strikeout to end the inning.
 
DiFilippo, the reigning PSAC East Player of the Week, punched a base hit in the sixth with one out and then advanced to second on a wild pitch. Morgan settled down, however, ending the threat with another strikeout. She retired the Marauders in order in the seventh to seal the victory for the Lions.
 
Brianna Andraos took the ball in the nightcap, going the distance while allowing six runs (three earned) on 11 hits and a walk with four punchouts. Against Andraos, Georgian Court jumped out to a 5-0 lead by the end of the away team's at-bat in the top half of the fifth inning, putting one run on the board in the first and tacking on four more in the fifth inning.
 
Despite the 5-0 deficit, the Marauders would not go quietly as the offense, which had been dormant for the first 11 innings of the day's action, finally woke up in the bottom of the fifth. DiFilippo lined a single into the outfield that scored the team's first run. Millersville got another run on the next at-bat when Gabbie Berry reached on a fielding error that allowed Jordan Sheffield to score, cutting the deficit to 5-2.
 
The Marauders got another run on Motsko's at-bat following Berry, as the junior punched a single through that scored DiFilippo. When it looked like Lion starter Illiana Teran was out of the inning, the Marauders made her pay for a pitch that got past catcher Meghan Sfraga. Andraos struck out swinging, but reached when Sfraga dropped the ball. With the bases full of Marauders, Berry crossed the plate to pull Millersville within one.
 
After the four-run outburst in the fifth, the offense put just three more hits on the board in the final two innings. Andraos gave up a run in the top of the seventh, making the Georgian Court lead 6-4. In the Marauder half of the final inning, the home team strung together a rally on hits by Berry and Ashley Cantiello that put the tying run just 180 feet from home plate. Deanna Daluise, who came on in relief of Teran, got the final out when she caught Bertoni swinging to end the game.
 
Even though the team's record drops to 28-18 on the season, Tuesday's games were mere exhibitions for Millersville, as the pair of contests had no effect on the team's playoff standings. The Marauders hope to make up ground Friday when they travel to Ship for a date with the Raiders. Millersville and Shippensburg split a pair of games earlier this season at the Millersville Softball Field. Friday's twinbill begins at 2:30 p.m.