🥎 Jayhawks Fall to No. 15 Arkansas at Home
LAWRENCE, Kan. – Sophomore Ashlyn Anderson and redshirt junior Shelby Gayre each hit home runs for the Jayhawks on Wednesday night but it wasn’t enough as Kansas fell, 7-4, to No. 15 Arkansas.
With the loss, Kansas falls to 16-9 on the season as Arkansas improves to 25-3.
Arkansas was able to capitalize early in the first inning off a few errors by the Jayhawks’ defense to take a 2-0 lead. The Jayhawks struck back in the bottom half of the inning with Sydnee Ramsey hitting a single to the shortstop and beating the throw. Morgyn Wynne brought Ramsey home after her hit into the outfield was dropped after a collision by two Razorback outfielders. The Jayhawks trailed 2-1 after one.
The Razorbacks scored three more in the top of the second and another in the fourth before KU was able to cut the lead in half in the bottom of the fourth.
Gayre was hit by a pitch with two outs and Anderson drove the seventh pitch she was thrown out of left field to make the score 6-3 in favor of Arkansas.
Gayre tallied the next run of the game with a solo shot out of left but Arkansas would score once more in the top of the seventh to close out the game.
Freshman Kasey Hamilton pitched the full 7.0 innings, to throw her first-career complete game as a Jayhawk with four strikeouts against the Razorbacks.
Stats of the Game
Anderson and Gayre each recorded a home run in the game to bring them to six and seven on the season, respectively. Anderson hit a two-run home run in the bottom of the fourth inning and Gayre recorded hers as a solo-shot in the bottom of the sixth. Gayre now has 27-career homers and sits seventh on KU’s all-time list.
Quoting Jennifer McFalls
“Kasey (Hamilton) did a great job being able to throw seven innings against a team of Arkansas’ caliber. The only thing that got us in trouble was not figuring out the umpires zone a little sooner. Outside of that, her performance was very solid. Offensively, having Shelby (Gayre) back was a huge presence for us. She is a tough out and there aren’t many people that look forward to throwing to her, so it’s great to get her back in the lineup as a difference maker and a leader. Moving forward, as a team we need to do a better job of not giving up so many runs early on. You can’t expect to face good teams and make comebacks when you are down by five runs. We need to set the tone and the pace moving forward from the first pitch and at bat of the game if we want to compete.”
Up Next
Kansas will begin Big 12 play on Friday, March 26 at 6 p.m. when the Jayhawks play host to No. 10 Oklahoma State at Arrocha Ballpark for the first of a three-game series.
