CARBONDALE, Ill. – Although the Northern Illinois University softball team dropped a pair of contests – 3-1 to Eastern Illinois University and 2-1 to Southern Illinois – Edwardsville – to close out the SIU Tournament Monday afternoon, Huskies head coach Christina Sutcliffe is keeping things in perspective.

"Overall we lost three games (in the tournament) by four runs so I think we just need to keep that viewpoint as we move forward into conference play," she said. "We're not playing poorly; we're just not playing sharp. We just need to sharpen up around the edges a little bit and the results will be different."

There certainly wasn't a shortage of hitting in both games as the Huskies combined for 10 hits, but they just couldn't come up with the timely one when they needed it.

"We just need to have better approaches at bat, and focus on the game within the game" Sutcliffe said. "It's the little plays that don't show up on the box score that we're not executing right now."

NIU took a 1-0 lead in the first inning against Eastern Illinois after Katie Keller singled, advanced to second on a Kelly Walinski single and scored on Avery Carnahan's single to left center field. But EIU responded with a two-run home run in the bottom half of the frame and an RBI double in the third inning.

Despite that, Huskies pitcher Delaney Ostrowski kept NIU in contention as she sent EIU down in order in the fourth and left the bases loaded for EIU in the fifth. In all, she worked five innings and struck out four batters.  

"Our pitchers both threw well in both games," Sutcliffe said. "Anytime you give up two runs you should be walking out with a win, so I definitely think our pitching held its own today."

SIU-Edwardsville grabbed a 1-0 lead in the third inning of Game 2 after a solo home run, but the Huskies tied in the fifth when Amberly Rodriguez reached on a fielder's choice, stole second and scored when Maddie Mackey laced a single to center field. It wasn't until the bottom of the seventh when SIU-E won on a home run to left-center field.

Mahy, Rodriguez and Mackey each had a hit for NIU, while Emily Dato tossed 6 1/3 innings, striking out four batters.

The Huskies (6-9) resume action on the weekend when they open Mid-American Conference play at Bowling Green, beginning with a 2 pm contest Friday.

"We're always going to find room to improve and that's our mentality going in," Sutcliffe said. "Bowling Green is going to be tough, we know they're pitcher-dominant so we'll need to have a plan of attack against that and just sharpen up around the edges a little bit."

-NIU-