Given new life as an at-large selection to the NCAA tournament, the Central College softball team came out flat in a 5-2 loss to the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Thursday afternoon.

The Dutch, who have struggled coming up with clutch base hits all season long, came up empty in the first inning despite getting back-to-back one out base runners. Then in the second, the Titans got a two-out hit followed by a homerun to take a 2-0 lead.

Oshkosh added two more runs in the third inning on five hits, three of which went off the gloves of Central infields. Central’s biggest chance came in the fourth, when they loaded the bases with one out, but again failed to score.

Daria Parchert’s sixth-inning RBI single and Tabitha Taylor’s run-scoring hit in the seventh were too little too late, and the Dutch are now one game from elimination.

Coach George Wares says that he was disappointed in the performance of his team.

“I just didn’t think that our intensity level and determination was quite where it needed to be, starting right away in the first inning. Give them credit, what we thought they could do, they did. They swing the bat well. But I thought we could put up some runs against them, and I’m disappointed with how we played more so than the loss itself.”

Central drop to 27-11 on the season. Up next is an elimination game at 1:30 Friday afternoon, and a win in that game would set up another elimination contest at 4:00. You can hear all of the action on 92.1 KRLS.

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