APPLETON, Wis. -- Carrie Van Groll blasted a pair of three-run homers in back-to-back innings in the nightcap of a nonconference doubleheader on Sunday to give the Lawrence University softball team a split with the University of Chicago.
Lawrence (9-16) won the nightcap 7-4 after Chicago (11-19) held on for a 6-5 win in the opener.
The Vikings trailed 4-1 heading to the bottom of the seventh in the nightcap. Justine Garbarski walked to start the inning, and Catherine Marinac followed with a single. Van Groll then hit a bomb over the center field fence off Kathleen Duffy to tie the game at 4-4.
After Meredith Foshag worked out of a minor jam in the eighth, Amanda Hauser led off the bottom of the inning with an infield single. Hillary Cheever followed with a bunt single and a pair of groundouts brought Van Groll to the plate. Van Groll belted a homer to center field to win the season finale for Lawrence.
Van Groll, a senior shortstop from Little Chute, Wis., is the first player in Lawrence history to hit two homers in one game. She finished the game 2-for-4 with three runs scored and six runs batted in. The six RBIs is the second-highest game total in school history, one short of the record set by Jenny Schmidt against Wisconsin Lutheran in 1990.
Foshag went the distance to pick up the win. She allowed eight hits, struck out one and did not walk a batter. Duffy took the loss for Chicago.
In the opener, the Maroons built a 6-0 lead through four innings. Chicago starter Lauren White held the Vikings hitless through five innings, but Lawrence finally got on the board against reliever Christy Corfias in the sixth.
Garbarski picked up a run-scoring single in the sixth, but three Chicago errors and a wild pitch helped Lawrence put three runs on the board and trim the margin to 6-3.
Lawrence rallied again in the seventh. After Van Groll walked and Foshag reached on an error, Duffy came on in relief. After a strikeout, Alex Goodson singled to score Van Groll to cut the lead to 6-4. After another strikeout, Hauser singled up the middle to score Foshag and cut the lead to 6-5. Duffy then got Cheever to fly out to end the game.