CLERMONT, Fla. – The Carroll University softball began the final morning in Florida with a tough loss but followed it up with a heroic walk-off win to end the trip on a positive note.
 
GAME 1
 The Pioneers (6-9) fell to SUNY Geneseo by a score of 2-8. Grace Bradley picked up the loss for the Pioneers who left eight stranded on the basepaths.
 
Bradley began the game and went four innings, allowing four runs on nine hits with three strikeouts and a walk. Riley Pavelka came in relief in the final two innings but she herself allowed four runs on four hits as well.
 
Bridget Rath led the Pios on offense with two hits of the team's five hits. Carroll batters were struck out eight times.
 
Lauren Harshbarger gave Carroll the first run of the game, batting in Abby Curtis who led off the inning with a walk. The Knights answered with two runs in the bottom of the first to take the lead. After Reagan Goluch advanced to third on an error by SUNY, Claudia Spencer knocked her in with an RBI groundout to level the game in the top of the fourth.
 
Geneseo answered the next half-inning with an RBI single and began to tack on five more runs over the next three innings.
 
GAME 2
The Pioneers (7-9) battled all game against Bowdoin and scored four runs in the bottom of the seventh to walk it off, 8-7. Sydney Raddeman provided the walk-off single to score Madison Palasz. Andrea Kuhne earned her third win of the season in the affair.
 
Kuhne replaced Breanna Roberts who started the first 1.2 innings. Kuhne entered the game fanning two and allowing two earned runs on nine hits over the final 5.1 innings.
 
Rath supplied the offense with three hits, two of them triples, and she scored three times. Kiana Johnson and Raddeman also supplied three hits, while Johnson led the group with two RBI. Carroll tallied six extra-base hits in the contest.
 
Bowdoin struck first in the top of the first inning to take a two-run advantage, and Carroll cut the deficit to one run the next half inning on Goluch's RBI single to score Raddeman from second.
 
The Polar Bears ran the score up to 4-1 as the Pioneers replaced Roberts in the top of the second with a runner on second. The arm of Rath from right field got the Pios out of a jam with a play at the plate.
 
Kaitlyn Reed smoked an RBI double to center field to score Abby Wimmer in the second inning, and a Johnson double scored Rath in the bottom of the third to keep the game close. Bowdoin responded with a two-run top of the fourth to take a 6-3 lead.
 
Rath tripled in the top of the fifth with two outs and was sent home the next at-bat to cut back into the lead. Bowdoin regained a three-run advantage in the top of the sixth, cutting away at the Pioneers' timing for a comeback.
 
Down three, Goluch lead off the bottom of the seventh and reached base on an error. Rath and Johnson both added singles to load the bases with no outs. Wimmer provided one RBI, and Madison Palasz another to bring it down to one run. With two outs, Curtis reached base on the Polar Bear's third error of the inning, scoring Johnson. In the first pitch of her at-bat, Raddeman smacked a single to center field to easily score Palasz from third base to win the game.
 
The Pioneers will return to Wisconsin and will open up Kilgour Field on Wednesday, March 29 for the first home game of the season against Beloit College.