ANGELO – The TexAnn Softball team dropped a doubleheader on the road to 6^th-ranked Angelo State Saturday afternoon to split the four-game series. Tarleton falls to 18-14 and 5-5 in Lone Star Conference play, while Angelo State improves to 24-7-1, 9-6-1.
  
The TexAnns knew they were in for a battle going on the road to play Angelo State, who is ranked sixth in the country.
 
A day after sweeping the first doubleheader and scoring 20 runs in the two wins, the next two games were dominated by pitching.
 
Angelo scored a run in the first and third inning to take an early 2-0 lead over Tarleton.
 
Tarleton was being no-hit going into the sixth inning by Brandy Marlett, who has a LSC-leading 1.19 ERA on the season.
 
The TexAnns were able to break through in the sixth, however, when Kaitlyn Thomas reached base on a one-out walk and Savannah Stech doubled to right center with two outs to bring home Thomas for Tarleton's first hit and run of the game.
 
Although Haley Freyman was on the losing end of the decision today, the freshman right-hander went all six innings, allowing only five hits and giving up two runs to lower her ERA to 2.80 on the season. Freyman (14-8) still leads the Lone Star Conference in wins in her first season with the Texans.
  
 
Angelo jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first inning behind an RBI double by Kenedy Urbany and a two-run single from Camry Weinheimer.
 
The Rams added their fourth run on an RBI single by Madison Greenwell in the second to jump out to an early 4-0 on Tarleton.
 
Hayley Freyman came in to pitch for Alyssa Ringhausen and shut down the Rams' high-powered offense and didn't allow a run for the final four innings to keep the TexAnns in the game.
 
Although Freyman gave up seven hits in 5 2/3 innings, the TexAnn defense backed the freshman up on the mound and forced the Rams to leave nine runners on base.
 
"Angelo played very well today, but we played good, too," TexAnn softball coach Julie Mata said. "I was very proud of the way our players handled themselves when faced with some challenging calls. We kept fighting and learned some valuable lessons that will help us down the road."
 
With the bases loaded and one out for the Rams in the fourth, Freyman got Urbany to hit into an inning-ending double play to prevent another Angelo scoring opportunity.
 
In the fifth inning, Nyka Wood led off with a walk and later advanced to third on Mikayla Stogsdill's pinch-hit single to center, the first of three straight TexAnn singles. With runners at the corners, Jessie Thompson also came in to pinch hit and drove in Wood for Tarleton's first run of the game.
 
Melody Mayse added her second hit of the game with an RBI single to center that scored Stogsdill, cutting the Angelo lead to 4-2.
 
Mayse finished 2-for-3 for her eighth multi-hit game on the season.
 
Erika Menchaca, who is hitting .347 on the year, added a seventh-inning double for the TexAnns.
 
"Getting a split and competing the way we did on the home field of the No. 6-ranked team with a huge crowd behind them speaks volumes to the character of our young team," said Mata.
 
The TexAnns return home to play a four-game series at the Tarleton Softball Complex against A&M-Commerce starting with a doubleheader on April 3 at 5 p.m.