University of North Texas
Middle Tennessee State
Kirk Sets Career Strikeout Record In Win
4/20/2013 12:00:00 AM | Softball
Murfreesboro, Tenn. (4/20/13) - Ashley Kirk became the Mean Green's career strikeout leader in the North Texas softball team's 3-2 win against Middle Tennessee on Saturday afternoon at Blue Raider Field. The Mean Green swept the doubleheader with an 8-1 win in the nightcap.
The Mean Green improves to 21-20 and 8-9 in the conference. The two conference wins moves North Texas up to fifth place in the standings. Middle Tennessee falls to 5-41 and 1-18 in the Sun Belt.
Kirk (10-7) pitched seven innings and allowed one earned run off four hits in the opening win. The junior struck out her seventh batter in the fifth inning to tie the strikeout record and then broke the record with a strikeout in the eighth inning.
Kirk now has 127 strikeouts this season and 448 in her career. The 448 strikeouts surpass Kristina Fowler's record, which she set in 2008. Kirk now holds the single-game, single-season and career strikeouts at North Texas.
Brittany Simmons (7-8) had one of her best outings of the season in the nightcap. She pitched a two-hit shutout through five innings. She gave up one run off a sacrifice fly in the sixth. Tori Bice pitched a hitless seventh inning for the Mean Green.
Jackie Miller supplied a bulk of the Mean Green offense with two home runs. She posted a two-run pinch-hit home run that tied the game in the opening win and then added insurance runs with a two-run shot in the nightcap. In the combined two games, she went 4-for-4 with two home runs, a double, a single and a walk.
North Texas needed a sixth-inning comeback to defeat the Blue Raiders in the first game. MT took a 2-0 lead in the third inning off a wild pitch and an error by the catcher.
Jordan Terry led off the sixth with a single. Lesley Hirsch moved her to second with a sacrifice bunt, and then Miller hit a pinch-hit home run to tie the game at 2-2. Taylor Schoblocher plated the game-winning run with a single to left field. Brooke Foster scored from second after reaching base with a single.
Foster went 3-for-4 in the game. North Texas outhit the Blue Raiders, 11-4, but left 13 runners stranded on base.
The Mean Green did a better job in the second game of stringing hits together. North Texas scored eight runs in seven innings off 12 hits.
North Texas broke out the bats in the third inning of the nightcap. Miller jump-started the offense with a double. She was moved to second with a Paige Kisling single, and then scored off a sacrifice fly by Hirsch. North Texas loaded the bases for Schoblocher with a Foster bunt single and a walk by Dani Hoff. Schoblocher plated two runs with a single to left field.
Miller hit her second homer of the day with a two-run long ball in the fourth. She doubled her home run total for the season with four.
North Texas sealed the win with runs in the fifth and sixth innings.
The Mean Green looks to sweep the conference series with an 11 a.m. game on Sunday, April 21.
