The Cyclones went into Wednesday’s game with the intention of reproducing their effort in a 2-1 win over the University of Northern Iowa for a sweep of their intrastate rival. When the game had finished, all they had was a series split and the disappointment of a 6-1 loss to the Panthers.

“That was a team that we just beat, and we just came off a win against Drake,” said shortstop Cary Akins. “There was no reason why we shouldn’t have beat them – it was pretty disappointing.”

The game went south quickly for Iowa State in the top half of the second inning when the Panthers erupted for four runs off pitcher Amie Ford. The big blow came from Morgan Paulson – who bats .459 with runners in scoring position – when she hit a two-out, bases-loaded double, plating all three Panthers. Ford was removed from the game to start the third inning in favor of junior Alyssa Ransom.

“I thought that [Ford’s] ball was flat, and she gave up four runs when we shouldn’t have,” said ISU coach Stacy Gemeinhardt. “She hasn’t been throwing as well as she can throw, so hopefully we figure it out by this weekend.”

Ransom kept Northern Iowa off the board until the seventh inning, and although the Cyclones were down in score, they didn’t seem to be down mentally.

“It was early and I felt we had plenty of time to get some runs and have some good quality at-bats, so I wasn’t to concerned about it at the time,” Gemeinhardt said.

Iowa State’s offense, despite being in the hole, was producing opportunities to score runs but not cashing in those opportunities. Directly following the four-run outbreak, the offense got two runners on base but failed to bounce back, stranding both runners.

“Good teams do that: They get scored on and they score back, but we couldn’t do it,” Akins said. “It ended up hurting us in the end.”

Although they didn’t bounce back immediately, the Cyclones did have a golden opportunity to get back in the game in the bottom of the third inning when they loaded the bases with nobody out and Jessica Quade standing in the box. Quade hit a line shot that was caught by the third baseman, who then stepped on third, and threw the ball to second to complete an inning ending triple play.

The three runners left stranded in the third brought the total through the first three innings to seven, prompting the team to voice some frustration with leaving runners on base.

“As soon as the runners get on, and you get up to bat, you know you have a job to do so you put a lot of pressure on yourself,” Akins said. “When it doesn’t happen, it’s probably one of the most frustrating things you can do as an offensive player.”

After the triple play, any offensive momentum the Cyclones had going seemed to disappear.

“We had a lot of momentum going for us and it was definitely like our air got deflated when [the triple play] happened,” Akins said. “That was a huge opportunity for us to come back and score but we didn’t and things were a little tougher from there on out.”