Syracuse softball drops doubleheader in home-opening

After 21 games on the road to start the season, Syracuse Softball returned to Skytop Softball Stadium for the first time in 2026 on Saturday for a doubleheader against No. 18 Virginia. Unfortunately for the Orange, it was far from a perfect home opener. 

On a cold, cloudy afternoon, SU dropped back to back games against Virginia. The Orange fell 7-1 in game 1 before suffering a 9-4 defeat in game 2. 

“They (Virginia), 1 through 9, just come at you,” SU head coach Shannon Doepking said. “They hit for power, they run really, really well. They’re just a very, very well-rounded team.” 

Virginia lived up to Doepking’s praise right away in game 1. In the top of the first inning, the Cavaliers loaded the bases with nobody out. But senior Madison Knight, who started in the circle for the Orange, was able to limit the damage to just one run. She struck out UVA’s Alex Call with runners on 2nd and 3rd to escape the inning.  

But the Cavaliers were right back at it in the next two innings. Hannah Weismer led off the top of 2nd with a solo shot to left field before Bella Cabral smashed a sharply hit line drive over the left field wall in the 3rd. Virginia led 3-0 after two and a half innings. 

In the bottom of the third inning, Syracuse got a glimmer of offense from sophomore Erika Zamora, who blasted her first-ever collegiate home run to center field. Virginia’s center fielder, Kassidy Hudson, tried to make a play at the fence. But after a hard collision with the wall, the ball bounced off of her glove and escaped the park for a homer. 

Unfortunately for the ‘Cuse, Zamora’s solo shot was the only hit that SU was able to manage in game 1. 

Everything fell apart for the hosts in the top of the fourth inning, when the Cavaliers broke the game open with four runs. Knight struggled to put batters away, allowing two RBI singles and dealing back-to-back walks. A passed ball at home plate that scored a run and a dropped ball at 3rd base didn’t help things. By the end of the inning, SU was down 7-1. 

The remaining three and a half innings were all scoreless. Knight started to get into her groove as the game went on. She pitched the full seven innings, allowing 13 hits and throwing 148 total pitches. 

“I think she (Knight) made some pitches,” Doepking said. “We just didn’t have bodies where those balls fell.”

30 minutes after Syracuse’s 7-1 loss in game 1, the teams returned to the diamond for game 2 of the doubleheader.

This time, it was senior Julianna Verni getting the nod on the mound for SU. The senior was looking to start strong, something she had failed to do in her last outing, allowing six first-inning runs against Florida State. Her start against Virginia on Saturday afternoon, however, was another one to forget. 

Verni hit UVA’s first batter with a pitch and walked the second. With nobody out, the Cavs had runners on the corners. Things only got worse when Macee Eaton, Virginia’s third batter, stepped up to the plate. Verni dealt her third wild pitch of the inning, scoring the runner from third to give the visitors an early lead. After the senior’s troubling start, Doepking had to make a pitching change. 

Senior Jackie Pengel stepped into the circle for the Orange and continued SU’s pitching struggles. She walked her first three batters, which scored two runs, before getting her first strikeout of the day to put one away. But then, Reagan Hickey stepped up and mashed a grand slam, giving Virginia a 7-0 lead in the top half of the first inning. 

SU finally ended the disastrous inning when Zamora made a defensive play at third. The sophomore was sharp in the infield across both games, making several full-extension plays.

On a day when there wasn’t much to cheer on for Syracuse fans, Doepking thought Zamora stood out. 

“I think we got better at third base today,” Doepking said. “She (Zamora) stepped up to the call, and I thought she played a great third base. And that was what we asked of her, the offense was just kind of the cherry on top.”

After her homer in game 1, Zamora went 1-1 at the plate with a walk in game 2. She was one of two SU players to record 2 hits on Saturday. 

Instead of accepting defeat after their difficult start, the Orange hung around with the Cavs and finally got their bats going in the bottom of the fourth inning.

After a third-inning Knight solo shot, her seventh homer of the season, SU entered the half inning down 9-1. The possibility of a five-inning mercy was very much on the table until Kendall Gaunt stepped up to bat. The freshman smashed a three-run home run off the scoreboard to cut UVA’s lead down to five runs. 

“We expected a lot from Kendall coming into this year. She was a very high recruited player, and she’s just struggled,” Doepking said. “So it was nice to see her start to figure some things out.”

Gaunt’s home run was the last scoring play of the game. Both teams failed to score in the final 3 innings of the game, despite a late push from Syracuse. At the end of the game, the Orange had actually outhit the Cavaliers, 6-4. SU had outscored UVA 4-2 in the final 6 innings of the game. But after its 7-run explosion in the first inning, it was Virginia who came out on top in a 9-4 ballgame. 

Syracuse recorded 7 hits across the 14 innings of play Saturday, the first three of which were home runs. The last 9 of SU’s runs have all come from home runs. And while many might see that as promising, Coach Doepking thinks it’s a worrying statistic. 

“I think that we’re not a home run-hitting team,” Doepking said. “So the fact that all of our runs right now are coming off home runs, while I think it’s great, is also problematic because we need to figure out how to be a little bit more consistent.”

Saturday’s two losses drop the Orange to 0-5 in ACC play. The two conference teams they’ve played, No. 10 Florida State and No. 18 Virginia, are two of the top three teams in the ACC. Doepking thinks that her squad can learn a lot from them. 

“Having an opportunity to watch some of these really talented teams play, it’s just, they do the little things well,” Doepking said. “When we struggle, we don’t do the little things well. So I think that’s the biggest thing we’ve taken from playing these guys.”

The series finale against No. 18 Virginia was canceled on Sunday because of inclement weather. The Orange will look to bounce back in a three-game series against NC State at Skytop Softball Stadium from Friday to Sunday.