Iet £Citdlgrn atilg 4 'M' softball bring out brooms in sweep of Badgers By Andy Knudsen The inning continued with so Daily Sports Writer offensive production from the W The Michigan softball team was verines. the Big Ten champion last season. Michigan took a 5-4 lead in The Wisconsin softball team did third after Davie doubled to ce not even exist. followed by RBI singles from Glea It is not a surprise, then, that the and Jessica Lang. .10 Wolverines (11-2 Big Ten, 34- Wisconsin jumped back ahead 10 overall) swept this weekend's in the fourth, and the Wolverines three-game series with the Badgers it at six in the bottom of the innin (1-10, 10-27). Hutchins decided to replace ju What is a surprise is how close the pitcher Kelly Holmes in the top o contests were. sixth with Griffin, a sophom Two of the three games needed an Holmes (13-5) gave up five ear extra inning to be decided, and the runs and nine hits in five innings third was a one-run game until Wis- "Kelly didnot pitch well," Hutch consin booted five balls in one in- said. "She looked pretty good at ning. start. As we got in a little troubl Michigan scored four runs in the her confidence is struggling." *hth inning yesterday to finish the Griffin, on the other hand, has b sweep, 5-1. Tracy Carr was the top a model of consistency. Wolverine at the plate. She In 18 innings pitched, went 2-for-4 with a double allowed two earned and an RBI. on I1 hits - not to n With this weekend's Mae tion her game-winn victories, the Wolverines softball double in the bottom o moved within one game eighth Saturday night in the loss column of first- coverage. scored Traci Conrad f place No. 13 Minnesota See Page 46. first. 1, 31-7), who lost at "Sara is a premier hi Rio State yesterday, 3-2. that's one of the reas Sara Griffin picked up we recruited her," Hutc the win in all three con- " said. "When the going tests, improving herrecord . tough, she turns it up. to 21-5. She gave up only In the last seven ga two earned runs in 18 innings pitched Griffin has been 13-of-26 (.500 this weekend. the plate. Michigan rebounded from a 4-0 "The last couple games I've bi deficit to win Saturday's extra-inning seeing (the ball) well," she said a nightcap, 7-6. In the opener, the Wol- a 4-of-7 performance Thurs verines took advantage of six Wis- against Toledo. *sin errors to win, 10-2, on only The score of Michigan's 10-2 seven hits. in Saturday's opener makes it 1 After notching one run in the top of like a Wolverine cakewalk. But it the first of Saturday's nightcap, the more of a Badger gift. Badgers made use of two Wolverine Only two of Michigan's 10 errors and a double by Keri McGee to were earned. send three more across the plate. Wisconsin trailed 3-2 with run The Badger rally wasn't stopped on second and third and only one until centerfielder Erin Martino made in the bottom of the third. a catch near the fence on Amanda But Griffin got herself out of a $ rg's wind-carried fly ball. At least by striking out Rebecca Gilgen run would have scored if Berg's snatching a line drive by Ang drive had found the ground, and the Rudolf. inning would have continued. The Badgers took themselves "Obviously when we go into extra- of the game in the fourth by com innings -that catch ended up saving ting five errors in the inning. the game," Michigan coach Carol Combined with a two-RBI sin Hutchins said. by Conrad and an RBI single by C The Wolverines battled back in the the Wolverines sent seven run bottom of the second. home. After Cathy Davie singled to right "Wisconsin did get some mon field, catcher Jennifer Smith gave tumn going - they can beat yc fchigan a rare spurt of power with Hutchins said. "Fortunately for team-leading second round-trip- we capitalized on some opport per of the season. ties." Alabama gymnasts t By Nancy Berger meet. Alabama finis Daily Sports Writer scoring well above Anyone who was acquainted with the central The Crimson Tid r gional championships knew that No. 2 Alabama of Michigan's top f was the favorite to win the region and a sure bet to with 49.550 points secure an NCAA bid. "They have great If odds-makers in Las Vegas were looking for a nasts," freshman N hefty payoff, they could have put their money on No individual gyr the Crimson Tide. Lucky bettors would have hit the Kim Kelly. Kelly ph jackpot. on the way to the Alabama didn'tjust win the meet. It left the rest around score of 39. of the field in Baton Rouge; La., including Michi- The magnitude off gan, drowning in its wake. gan an idea of what "Alabama was just on," Michigan coach Bev to compete with th *cki said. "I don't think they counted a 10th off on a landing. They were perfect." The defending regional champions reigned over More WO~ml the seven other teams with an NCAA record 198.075 covergO ft points. Their score was nearly two points ahead of See Page 8B. Michigan's 196.275. While the title was expected to be decided be- tween Michigan and Alabama, no one could have predicted such a flawless and dominating perfor- "If we want to con mance by the Crimson Tide. to obtain perfection "Alabama had a night that they will never have Michigan had a g ain," Plocki said. indicated by its sco The Wolverines will surely be hoping that Ala- nearly as flawless a bama won't have a night like that in two weeks The event that M when the two teams compete again in the NCAA though, was the flo championships. Kabnick had a stum The Crimson Tide dominated every aspect of the fell. WEEKEND GAMES ome vol- the nter ason 6-5 tied rig. nior f the ore. rned s. hins the e - been , she runs nen- ing f the that rom tter, sons hins gets "1 mes ) at been after day will ook was runs ners e out jam and gela out mit- ingle arr, ners men- ouus uni- Despite the fact that Michigan pitcher John Arval surrendered a grand slam in a 5-3 loss to Northwestern Saturday, the Wolverines took three of four from the Wildcats in the weekend series. Arval saved both games for Michigan yesterday. JOE WESTRATE/Daily Scrapping for victories Blue uses hit-and-mun to take three of four from 'Cats By James Goldstein Daily Sports Writer EVANSTON -The Michigan baseball team is starting to get the hang of this. It doesn't matter how you score the runs, it's how many runs you score. The Wolverines scrapped their way to victo- ries in three out of four games against North- western over the weekend at Rocky Miller Stadium. After a 5-3 loss in the opener, Michi- gan beat the Wildcats 8-2 in nine innings, 5-3 in eight innings and 5-2. The Wolverines remain on top of the Big Ten with a 12-4 record, leading Illinois by a half game. Michigan displayed aggressive hitting at the plate and heads-up running on the basepaths in their three wins. Michigan coach Geoff Zahn called for numerous hit-and-runs. The Wolver- ines had a season-high six stolen bases in yesterday's first game. And Michigan scam- pered home on three Northwestern wild pitches in the series. All in all, Michigan coach Geoff Zahn couldn't be happier with his squad taking ad- vantage of every situation. "Our guys are hustling," Zahn said. "They take advantage of mistakes from the other team. We put some pressure on and they come through and don't fold." Michigan pitcher Brian Besco sure didn't fold yesterday. The sophomore picked up his first career win in his first start of the season. Besco gave up two runs and two hits in five innings pitched, walking three and striking out one. The Wolverines' table-setters, Mike Cervenak and Kirk Beermann, each had RBI singles that gave Michigan an early 2-0 lead. And in the sixth inning, Mick Kalahar came through in the clutch with a one-out, bases- loaded single that drove in two and provided Besco with a comfortable four-run cushion. Closer John Arvai worked the final two in- nings for his second save in the series and sixth on the season. J.D. Engle picked up the loss, which dropped See HIT-AND-RUN, Page 7B t- mr too much for Micignj shed first in every single event, 49 points in every rotation. ide placed five gymnasts ahead inisher on the bars and finished on the event. all-around and individual gym- ikki Peters said. mnast was as great as Alabama's laced first in every single event title and finished with an all- 750. Alabama's success gives Michi- the Wolverines will have to do e Crimson Tide. n 's gymnastics rom regionals. In spite of this setback, Michigan remained fo- cused and did well the rest of the meet. The only event in which the Wolverines did better than what the scores indicated was the bal- ance beam. Plocki said that the team deserved better than its score of 48.875. "Our beam, we didn't just hit, we nailed," Plocki said. "I felt our beam scores were tight. Burke and Kabnick rocked and got 9.725 and 9.6." "I don't think (Alabama) was overscored. No- body was overscored," Peters said. "The judging was fair." Probably the most interesting point to note about the scores was how high they were, especially compared to last year. - At the 1995 regional championships, Alabama won with 196.675, while Michigan clinched sec- ond place with 195.725. "There was a higher level of competition than last year at the meet held here," Plocki said. Despite the increase in competition, there was a decrease in the number of NCAA qualifiers from the central region. Louisiana State failed to gain a wild-card entry into the NCAA championships after coming in ninth at last year's nationals. While the Tigers and the rest of the regional field goes home, Michigan will travel to Tuscaloosa, Ala. The Crimson Tide is not only No. 1, but has home field advantage for the NCAA champion- ships. ntend with the big guys, we have n," Plocki said. good meet this past weekend as re, but the Wolverines weren't as Alabama. dichigan really struggled with, or exercise. Sophomore Heather mble, and freshman Lisa Simes Michigan's Andrea McDonald tied for fourth in the all-around this weekend.